Full text of "SPIN"
PHOTOGRAPHS BY RICHARD BURBRIDGE
fOR EXCLUSIVE BEHIND-THE-SCENES VIDEO. LOS ON TO SPIN.COM/JUNEC0VER
HARD ROCK
SOFT ROCK
v
GLAM ROCK
V
J
CLASSIC ROCK
PUNK ROCK
/ V
SOME PERFECTION IS DEBATABLE.
Cor
SOME IS NOT. Made by hand from 100% blue agave.
The world's #1 ultra-premium tequila.
SIMPLY PERFECT.
simplvperfect.com
Th J. s One
KNN0-ENU-W3DX
SHAPE
Available Spring 2007 Not responsible for third-partv conteni or services. Some features are network, condition and device dependent and are not available in all areas or on all devices. Service is
subject to Helio's Membership Terms. Other restrictions apply. See your Hello representative for details, Helio, the Helio logo. Ocean and "Don't Call it a Phone" are trademarks of Helio LLC and aJI
other marks are the property of their respective owners, ©2007 Helio LLC
Cc|
SHIFTER
CALL IT ocean; DON'T CALL IT A PHONE;
Ocean's innovative design makes it the world's first dual-slider with both a numenc keypad and a separate lull QWERTY keyboard.
Which means it's perfect for making a call, banging out an email or typing an instant message. And on Helio's nationwide 3G
network, you'll truly en|oy Ocean's new HTML browser plus incredible access to all your IMs, text/pic messages and emails in
one simple place. We're talking Yahoo!," AOL^ Windows Live,'" Gmail." You can even sync your Microsoft' Office Outlook" email,
contacts and calendar right there on your Ocean. Which makes it clear. Two shapes really are better than one.
www.helio.com
Cl
A PHONE ON ONE SIDE
Introducing the Upstage** by Samsung, exclusively from Sprint. It's a flip
phone, fltpped. One side is a phone. Flip it and you have a music player.
Get faster wireless downloads with one-touch access to the Sprint Music
Store's 1.5 million song playltst. Then instantly download up to 1,000 of
1 800 Sprint 1
sprint com/introducingupstage
to the nearest Sprint or Nextel Store
Olfi'i eilfK 6/17/07 or while supplies last Coverage not available everywhere Offers not
utv.iildbk' m alt markets oi retail locations. May require credit approval 8t deposit Taxes excluded.
Up to %ib dttivalion and $200 early termination fees apply Add'l terms and restrictions
appV See store or sprint com (or details M»i\-in rebate: Requires activation by 5/28/07
if handset iS purchased from 4/22/01 to S/U/07 If handset is purchased from 5/14/07 to
A MUSIC PLAYER ON THE OTHER
your favorite songs right out of thin air and carry them with you wherever
you go for just 99( each with a Sprint Power Vision Pacl<. Ready to tallt? Flip
the Upstage again to spread the word. Or Iteep the music pumping while you
text, browse the web and even play games, all on the Sprint Power Network.
$99
99
U p Stag EMI"
$149.99 2-year price plus $50 mail-in rebate
with new line activation It 2-year agreement
^^^^^^
6/17/07, mail-in rebate requires activation by 7/2/07- Rebate cannot exceed purchase price.
Allow 8-12 weeks for rebate. See rebate form for add'l restrictions. Other Servias & Oownkuds: Add'l
data or voice charges apply ©2007 Spnnt Nextel. All rights reserved. SPRINT, the Spnnt logo and other
trademarks aretrademarks of Sprint Nextel. Samsung isa registered trademark of Samsung Electronics
America Inc. and its related entities. All third-party trademarks are property of their respective owners.
JUNE 2007
FEATURES
56 Rock Star! /?odf Star?
Time was when being a rocl< star
meant living large, acting crazy,
and resembling an alien (or a
poodle). But few of today's chart-
toppers act — or even want to
look — like rock stars. What ever
happened to all that wonderful
sleaze? PLUS: A pop quiz: Rock
star or banender? by david browns
62 Marilyn Manson
How the absinthe-sipping,
daylight-shunning, foot-fetishizing
rock'n'roll vampire weathered
a devastating breakup to create
his rawest album yet. PLUS:
A gallery of his grotesqueries.
BY JONATHAN AMES
70 The Spin
Interview: Bjork
The pride of Iceland reflects on
life as a Sugarcube, working with
Timbaland, and obsessing over
Britney Spears' "knickers."
PLUS: Her complete discography.
■ BY PHOCBE flEILLY
76 Arctic Monkeys
After a roller-coaster year, the
record-setting next-generation
Brirpoppers are back — a little
older, a lot wiser, and wearing
much funnier outfits. PLUS;
The most Englishest bands ever.
BY STEVE KANDELl
80 The Art of the Hustle
Indie, shmindic — what does it
take to get a major-label deal
nowadays? Spin hits the bricks
with unsigned Atlanta rockers
Uncrowned, rock's hungriest
band, by charles aaron
"We were a bit
frightened, so we
put up this defense
mechanism."
ON THE COVER
Photographed exclusively for Spin by
Richard Burbridge
Creative consultant: Mary Alice Stephenson
Styling by Luke Storey Grooming by Mira Hyde,
using Elcmis products for mal<eup and Bumble
and Bumble for hair/celestineagency.com. On
Manson: Junker jacket and Henry Duarle sfiirl,
jransomla.com.
DREAMERS WANTED.
SCHOOL OF RECORDING ARTS
800.226.7625
33(H) Univarsity Boultvard
• WillUr Park. FL 32792
Financial siiJ available to thosu who quahly
Career developmenl assistance ■
Acciediled School, ACCSCT
ONE OF THE
FIVE BEST
MUSIC
PROGRAMS
IN THE COUIMW
— Rolling Stone Mtguinw
2006 Full Sail Inc All rishts reserved.
Real World Education
INSIDE SPIN
CONTRIBUTORS
Tina Tyrell
Photographer, In My Room (page 62)
^Though not a glamorous estate, the home of Dinosaur Jr.'s J Mascis stilt made Tyrell
envious. 'It was beautiful and old," she says. "Every single room was interesting, but I
was drawn to his piano and Lifecycle." Tyrell has also shot for Nylon and yone. Favorite
album: The Isley Brothers' 3*3 Ffrst concert: George Michael, 1987
Jonathan Ames
Writer, "Return of the Living
Dead "(page 621
^ For Ames, the most surprising thing
about Marilyn Manson was how familiar
he seemed. "He reminded me of my
childhood best friend," Ames says.
The author of the novels The Extra Man
and Wake Up, Sir!, Ames has also written
for The New York Times. His graphic
novel, The Alcoholic, will be out next
year. First concert: Rush, 1981
David Browne
Writer, "Rock Star! Rock Star?"
(page 56)
-) Browne, who has written for
Entertainment Weekly and The New
York Times, is no stranger to destructive
rock-star behavior. "Sometimes I stomp
on advance CDs I don't like," he says.
He is the author of Dream Brother: The
Lives & Music of Jeff & Tim Buckley and
an upcoming biography of Sonic Youth.
Greatest rock star of all time: Iggy Pop
Misty Keasler
Photographer, "The Art of the
Hustle" (page 80)
<- Following unsigned rockers
Uncrowned around Austin during South
by Southwest, Keasler became convinced
of their potential. "They are full of
energy," she says, "and they feel like
they're on the brink of something big."
Her book, Love Hotels: The Hidden Fantasy
Rooms oflapan, is out now. Favorite '90s
album: Ani DiFranco's Living in dip
C.
ilerial
INSIDE SPIN
EDITOR'S LETTER
Where's the Beef?
MY IDEA OF THE PERFECT ROCK STAR is actually a character
in a movie from 1974. He's called Beef, and he's the strapping
yet preening singer played by Gerrit Graham in Brian De Raima's
Phantom of the Paradise, one of only two films I ever sat through
twice (consecutively) in a theater (the other was Xanadu — don't
ask). Part David Bowie space cadet, part Alice Cooper monster
masher, part Bea Arthur circa Maude, Beef assumes the posture
and impetuousness of a hard-rock frontman and gets to utter such
delicious bon mots as "Man, you better get yourself a castrato for
this, 'cause it's a little out of my range." De Palma takes the term
"shock rocker" to its literal extreme when he has Beef electrocuted
mid-performance by a neon lightning bolt. Sure, caricatures
probably don't come any broader, but what makes Beef so
perversely appealing is that he's an awkward divo who will do
anything to please a crowd, even if it means falling flat on his ass.
He's what I always thought rock stars should be: sexy, dangerous,
outrageous, and funny. And at least a little self-aware.
This month, rockers are taking center stage in these pages.
Jeff Buckley biographer David Browne explores the nature
of current rock stardom in a provocative essay, while
novelist/raconteur Jonathan Ames spends a few wild nights
with Marilyn Manson, who may very well be the last of a
dying breed. Elsewhere, Spin music editor Charles Aaron gets
extraordinary access to the members of the young Atlanta band
Uncrowned, who want to be rock stars
in the worst way. And they might just
succeed — if they can stand to fall flat
on their asses.
I'll shut up now and let the magazine
do the talking.
Doug Bred
Editor
Coi-
IN STORES NOW
Features
'Maria" "Try" and "Lady Loop'
Appearing this summer at
Summer Camp, High Sierra, Wakarusa,
AND 1 Peaks Festival
On Tour this May
AL0MUSIC.COM BRUSHFIREREC0RDS.COM
A WORLDWIDE CONCERT TOUR HIGHLIGHTING A DISTINCTIVE BLEND OF GLOBAL MUSIC WITH AN FOUAl l,Y
UNIQUE MIX OF GLOBAL COCKTAILS. THE PERFECT COCKTAIL IS MIXED WITH CAREFULLY SELECTED
INGREDIENTS. RHYTHM AND RHYME. HEART AND SOUL. EXPERIENCE HENNESSY ARTISTRY.
2007 U.S. CONCERT TOUR
NEW YORK
LOS ANGELES
MIAMI
CHICAGO !
SAN FRANCISCO
WASHINGTON DC
LAS VEGAS
i
COMING SOON
Hennessy
VERV MPtC.AL
c;o (; NAc
FOR EXCLUSIVE GUEST TICKETS GO TO WWW HENNESSYAHTISTRV COM
Please Drink Responsibly ImporlBd cognac Hennessy.* 40% AIC./V0I. (80"J, i©2007 lfnpon«<J Oy Moel Hefwitssy USA. New Ifark. NY Hennessy » a registered rr*lemaf1<
I Hill' I ' i I '■'"■'31 ii
FROM THE MIND OF JANE'S ADDICTION
FRONT MAN AND LOLLAPALOOZA
FOUNDER PERRY FARRELL COMES
A LONG-AWAITED NEW ALBUM THAT
ROCKS HARD AND GROOVES HARDER.
FROM THE INFECTIOUS ANTHEM
"WISH UPON A DOG STAR"
TO THE HYPNOTIC PULSE OF
"HARD LIFE EASY/' PERRY AND HIS
BAND PLAY HOST TO THE ULTIMATE
PARTY, WITH FEATURED GUESTS FLEA,
JOHN FRUSCIANTE, PETER HOOK,
FERGIE AND MORE.
SPIN
EDITOR Doug Brod
DEPUTY EDITOR Steve Kandell
MANAGING EDITOR Catherine Davis
MUSIC EDITOR Charles Aaron
ASSISTANT EDITOR Kyle Anderson
RESEARCH EDITOR T. Phoebe Reilly
RESEARCH ASSISTANT Lane Brown
FASHION MARKET EDITOR
Cassandra S. Tsaknis
DESIGN DIRECTOR Devin Pedzwater
ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Liz Macfarlane
PHOTO DIRECTOR Michelle Egiziano
ASSOClAn PHOTO EDITOR Gavin Stevens
PHOTO ASSISTANT Jennifer Edmondson
INTERACTIVE DIRECTOR Peter Gaston
ASSOCIATE EDITOR, ONLINE MacKenzie Wilson
ONLINE PRODUCER Eric Nowels
ONLINE CONTRIBUTING WRITER William Goodman
PUBLISHER Malcolm Campbell
ADVERTISING DiREaOR Michael Albanese
FASHION ACCOUNT MANAGER Nick PaStuIa
ADVERTISING ASSOCIATE Kiana Pirouz
EVENTS DIRECTOR Barbara Lang
CLIENT SERVICES MANAGER Monina Arcega
MARKETING COORDINATOR Dan Mims
MARKETING DESIGNER Sonia Ana Ortiz
ASSISTANT TO THE PUBLISHER Sarah Craft
WEST COAST ASSISTANT
Michelle Konstantinovsky
OFFICE MANAGER Maryam Foye
CORPORATE COMPTROLLER John Verduzco
BUSINESS MANAGER Victoria Rady
ACCOUNTING MANAGER Dawn Labriola
CREDIT AND COLLECTIONS MANAGER Roger Millette
ACCOUNTS PAYABLE COORDINATOR Tyrone Comet
CIRCULATION MANAGEMENT Bobbi Gutman & Co.
PRODUCTION AND IT DIRECTOR Timothy Wudarski
ASSOCIATE PRODUCTION DIRECTOR Erech Swanston
DIGITAL IMAGING SPECIALIST Eli Neugeboren
IT MANAGER Joshua S. Glaser
PREPRESS Spin Media LLC
PRINTING RR Donnelley
CREATIVE CONSULTANT Mary Alice Stephenson
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Andrew Beaujon, David Browne, Timothy Gunatilaka, Will Hermes, Dave Itzkoff,
Robert Levine, Greg Milner, Troy Patterson, David Peisner, Brian Raftery, Ira Robbins, Mikael Wood
PUBLIC RELATIONS DIRECTOR Elaine Garza
PUBLICITY CONSULTANT Jada Williams
INTERNS Beryl Chung, Andrew Craig, Kristina Ensminger, Laura Gardner, Kate Heath,
Pavla Kopecna, Leah Morgan, Briana Mowrey, Melissa Notaro, Nick Pandolfi, Mary-Louise Price,
Michelle Quinn, Iliana Rabun-Wood. Candice Ralph, Rich Weiss
PRESIDENT Tom Hartle
Spin Media LLC / The McEvoy Group LLC
CEO Nion McEvoy
PRESIDENT Jack Jensen
VP AND COO Tom Femald
CREATIVE CONSULTANT Heather Luplow Hartle
FOUNDER Bob Guccione Jr.
New York Advertising Sales Office 205 Lexington Ave., 3rd FI., NY, NY 10016
212-231-7400; Fax 212-231-7300
MIDWEST ADVERTISING SALES,
CHRISTOPHER SCHUBA & COMPANY LLC, CHICAGO
Christopher Schuba, Dan O'Conor,
SALES ASSISTANT Tina Stasny,
312-604-0350; Fax 312-604-0360
PACIFIC NORTHWEST ADVERTISING SALES,
HARTLE MEDIA VENTURES, SAN FRANCISCO
Paige Thomas, 415-362-7797; Fax 415-362-9797
DETROIT ADVERTISING SALES, FUEL DETROIT, DETROIT
James McNulty, Mike Peters, Erica Bigley,
BUSINESS MANAGER Jill Randall, MARKETING
MANAGER Liz Fomal, SALES COORDINATOR Ashley
Caplan, 248-649-3835; Fax 248-649-5638
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SALES, LOS ANGELES
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA ADVERTISING DIRECTOR
Kelly Watson, 310-664-0368
SPIN.COM INTERACTIVE SALES: Blackrock Digital, Manhattan Beach, CA
Chris Smith 310-210-9344; Fax 310-545-8496; csmith@spin.com
For questions about new or current subscriptions, call 800-274-7597 or e-mail
SPMcustserv@cdsfulfillment.com. To change your address, send both old and new addresses
to Spin, PO Box 5686, Harlan, IAS1S93-1 186. Allow six to eight weeks for processing.
Cci
It's not about where you sit, but
how you live. How you experience
life, for yourself and with your
friends. !
Best Seat in the House is
about more than the front row.
It's about life in front.
Let Pioneer help you create
that experience. Put information,
communication and entertainment
right in front of you...
and everything else behind.
sound, vision, soul
pioneer-bestseat. com
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
Touring in support of Black Holes & Revelations, grandiose
Brit rockers Muse paid a visit to their favorite state in the
union. "Californian crowds tend to be very receptive to the
more experimental aspects of our band," says frontman
Matt Bellamy. "Plus, there are lots of pretty faces in I.A.,
and everyone is dressed cooler than us." At left, Bellamy
rocks his favorite guitar face, which he describes as "keen."
PHOTOGRAPH BY KELLY A. SWIFT
WWW.5PIN.COM JUNE 2007 23
I
THE SPIN MIX
Songs You Need to Download Now!
Go to SPIN.com for samples and links to these tunes, vid clips, and more
n Hurricane 'A BAY BAY" Hurricane is a Shreveport, Louisiana rap kid and "A Bay Bay" is slang meaning
MM "Katrina may have destroyed our house, but this beat is iller than an insurance agent" ^
Beth Ditto and Jarvis Cocker "tehptation- At this year's NME Awards, the Gossip's gale
force of /-you sensuality faces off against Cocker's suave slither on this electrifying Heaven 17 cover
Paramore' 'MISERY BUSINESS" These seasoned Tennessee pop punks are led by a redheaded teenager
(Hayley Williams) writh a fierce voice, simmering charisma, and finally, a chorus to match.
Lit Wayne "walk it our- ui wayne ain't half as historic as he and his bagmen think, but he can write
a flashy crossword puzzle, and props for rhyming "Funyun" with "Paul Bunyan."
Against Me! "white people for peace" ILIVE at the key CLUBI over a thick bed of thorny
guitars, a new broadside from America's best punk band about the futility (and necessity!) of protest songs.
Deemi "soundtrack of HY life" Brooklyn single mother of two weathers domestic abuse, drugs,
and despair, then cattiartically belts out the year's most devastating R&B moment.
Karen 0 and Kool Keith ' "THE TEASER" From an unreleased 2005 porn-movie tribute album,
she baby-tawks about ice cream while he fantasizes about Hooters shorts. Oioice of lubricant: Lubriderm?
Joanna Newsom ' 'COLLEEN" On this gorgeous picaresque, from a new three-song EP, tfie harpist
darts and scampers in a rrxire Irish trad-folk direction, grounded by banjo and accordion.
St. Vincent 'NOW.NOW." Her walflsh presence and lilting voice peg Annie Clark, a.k.a. St. Vincent, as just
another Bjork wannabe— except that her songs and guitar playing are pure enchantment.
NYOIL "SHOUT IT IN THE STREETS" The New Yori< MC who caused a stink by saying "coon-ass rappers"
(50 Cent, Cam'ron) should get "lynched" comes back breathing more fire.
Ted Leo "rock N roll DREAMS LL come through" This breathless cover of "the greatest song
ever written" (originally performed by comedic trickster Jon Wurster) makes "Born to Run" sound terse.
White Rabbits "the plot' An Indie^xip soul raver w/ith a nonstop beat, atmospheric violin
interlude, and raucous whoa-oh-oh refrain that gives the Style Council an open-throated heartland shove.
Spoon "YOU GOT YR. cherry BOMB" With the tambourine, reverbed keyboards, and horn section
threatening to build into a Spectoral "Wall of Sound," Britt Daniel stays pithy, playful, pointed— perfect.
Department of Eagles "no one does it UKE you" Crizzly Bear s Oamel Rossen and college
buddy Fred Nicolaus prove trip-hop isn't dead— it's just become a twrinkly folk song in a doo-wop daze.
Queens of the Stone Age "turning on the screw The Big Beat" dmm thud, migraine-
groovy Greg Ginn guitar riff, a choir of disoriented meth dealers, and a creepy-crawl solo. Cult-inducing.
Must-See Videos
Alanis Morissette Dizzee Rascal
Canada's legendary queen
of angst may be past
her expiration date, and
Black Eyed Peas are still
insufferable, but when they
come together, you get
Internet magic. Morissette's
piano^llad makeover of
a song about Fergie's ass is
enough to make this clip a
classic, but it's augmented by
some awesomely dead-pan
thugs and Alanis' willingness
to cover herself in "iceys."
Police across England have
been cracking down on
young people who wear
hoodies, suggesting that
such "street clothing" is
primarily worn by a criminal
element. Here, Dizzee
is chased out of his flat
by a posse of top-hatted,
bloodlusting gentry on
white horses. The savagery
of this 21st-century fox hunt
marks the first great piece of
protest music of 2007.
Blonde Redhead
Blonde Redhead's latest
album is much more
spare and atmospheric
than previous efforts, and
they've taken that concept
literally on the record's
first video, with soft-focus
clouds wafting in and out
of washed-out shots of the
band. It's a mind-bender that
plays tricks on the eye and
perl'ectly meshes with the
song's stuttering beat and
Kazu Makino's siren vocals.
Dan Le Sac vs.
Scroobius Pip
: nuu ivu;
Always Kill"
Over a meaty sucker
punch of a backbeat and
carnival -horror keyboards,
an angry guy with a bushy
beard and a baseball
cap lays down the new
commandments as he
tears through the streets
of London. Some of his
excellent advice: "Thou
Shalt not attend an open
mic and leave as soon as
you've done your shitty
little poem or song."*
Words to live by.
28 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
AMAZING QUALITY SOUND ON YOUR PHONE. i /
V CAST Music from Verizon Wireless brings superior MPS sound and your favorite ar
Hear for yourself at any Verizon Wireless store or at verizonwireless.com/music.
V CAST l> avalbUe to more Ilun 202 million people in 242 major metropolilan areas in the US.
Subject 10 Customer Agmt & Calling PUn. Airtime req'd for musk downloads Windows^ XP req'd for downloads to PC; syncing requires compatible USB cable (sold separately). Per song charges apply Offers & coverage, which vary by service
not available everywfwre; maps at verizonwlreless.com. Always dovwrtoad legally.
orial
FEEDBACK@SPIN.COM
Only on SPIN.com!
^MARILYN HANSON
EXCLUSIVE
After being shot for this month's
cover, IVIarilyn Manson hung out
with SPIN.com well into the night.
Catch our candid video interview
with the shock roclier.
www.spin.com/iunecover
Brock Around
the Clock
It's time to face facts:
Modest Mouse are a
definitive American indie-
rock band ["Partners in
Crime," April] . With the
combination of Isaac
Brock's savvy inteUigence,
Johnny Mart's mystique,
and the rugged tunes on
We Were Dead Before the
Ship Even Sank, the band
can now take its place
beside legends like R.E.M.
and the Replacements.
All they needed was a
little help from a Brit!
KEITH CORMIER
MACON, GEORGIA
Oberst, Last, Always
Thanks for the article on Conor Oberst
["The Spin Interview," April] . He's
such a great role model and has a
wonderful view on a number of issues.
I especially enjoyed reading his quotes
about our failed president to my
father, who called Conor an ignorant
child with his head up his ass. What
he doesn't realize is that Oberst is the
voice of a generation that I'm proud to
be a member of.
ARI TRICKEY
GRASS VALLEY, CALIFORNIA
SEEING DOUBLES,
Look-alike? Or not?
Alex Kapranos
WILLIAM FOSTER Age: 35 LHe as
Kapranos: "A lot of people ask me
how I came to resemble him, but
it also must be asked: How did he
come to resemble me?"
Do you resemble a rocker? Send us a photo
and let us decide. E mail a high-resotution
.)P^ file and your phone number to
seeingdoublesQspin.com.
0 u
Team Players
April's list of Rock's
25 Greatest Team-ups
was great, but where
were Sonic Youth and
Jim O'Rourke? What
about U.K.K.L.E., for
that matter?
MATTHEW RrrCHIE
HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA
Good try, but the list was rendered
moot by the lack of Mos Def and Talib
Kweli as Black Star. And don't even get
me started on why "CaUfornia Love"
makes the list but Ice Cube's historic
collaboration virith the Bomb Squad
goes unnoticed.
MONTY FRANKUN
SAN BERNARDINO, CALIFORNIA
How could you have Johimy Marr on
the cover of an issue that features the
best collaborations and not include
Electronic, his team-up with Bernard
Sumner of New Order?
DMrtRY PAVLOVSKY
CHICAGO
I hate to quibble, but while I was
excited to see MadviUainy on
your list of the best
collaborations, I have to
say that both MF Doom
and Madlib have done
superior projects: Doom
with Danger Mouse as
DangerDoom on The
Mouse & the Mask, and
'Lib's fantastic hookup with Jay Dee on
the Jaylib records.
TERRY BLU
UNCROR, NEVI/ lERSEY
Thank you for including the Pogues
and Kirsty MacCoU on your list of the
ten best one-off team-ups ["Singles
Going Steady," April] . Now, if only you
could have Included a nice picture of
the beautiful toothless wonder Shane
MacGowan. Sldinte!
JAMIE HENDEL
GLENSlOE, PENNSYLVANIA
CONTACT US Gotowww.spin.com/
community/letters, e-mail feedback®
spin.com. or mail us at Spin, 205 Lexington
Ave., Third Floor, New York, NY 10016
Please include your full name, mailing address, and
phone number for verification, letters may be edited
for length and clarity.
GET SPIN BACK ISSUES citetheissu. by
month and year, tnctude your addmt, and send credit
card info, check, or money order for $10 to: ISt-SPIN, 30
Montgomery St, Jersey Ctty, Nj 07302. Please allow four
to six weeks for delivery. You can also call 800-274-7S97.
-^THE WALKMEN MEET SPIDEY
We visited the Walkmen's New
York City rehearsal space and
filmed the band playing "Red River,"
their song from the Spider-Man 3
soundtrack. Watch the performance
and see what the band had to say
in our exclusive interview.
www.spin.com/spiderman3
-^FESTIVAL MADNESS ^
Check out our complete Coachella
report (loaded with video
interviews with your favorite
desert-dwelling artists), and get
ready for our Bonnaroo coverage,
which kicks off in mid-June.
www.spin.com/coacheUa07
www.spin.com/bonnaroo07
-> ARTIST OF THE DAY-
UNSIGNED
This July, SPIN.com vyill be featuring
some of the nation's top unsigned
musicians as Artists of the Day.
If you think you've got what it
takes, post your band's profile,
music, and videos at SPIN.com to
be eligible!
www.spin.com/yourartistoftheday
The SPIN.com Poll
Marilyn Manson might be the last
rock star, but who else could claim
the title?
A Jack White
B Carlos D
C Josh Homme
D Kid Rock
E Julian Casablancas
F Trent Reznor
Cast your vote at SPIN.comI
S
a
30 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cr;
llvwooti Freei
ur, /'"l/TBHISWfM^f-lS •
Real-Time Traffic
Updates - Built-ln RDS-
TMC Tuner provides current
traffic flow conditions and
the best routes to avoid
high-congestion areas
0B3 ^01 amtM
■ Tha parfsM tzpsnencs
HDD IVIusic Server
Store up to 24GB ol music
internally from CD Albums
or PC music dovmloads
^ O.SW BHiBer's puz«_
M t 10.. punmssclian mT
N 10. DurasaiiMiLl
I- i»« Ittstramo Pin* .T.
Extensive Map
Coverage - Built In 40GB
HDD 15 preloaded vnth13
million points of interest
and includes data for all 50
U S. States and Canada
Redefining Navigation
Our KD-NX5000 HDD Navigation/DVD/CD Receiver with 3.5" wide
monitor is Bluetooth"' and iPod*' Ready and wrapped in a remarkably
sleek, single DIN unit. With maps, music, and more, JVC Mobile
has you covered wherever you want to go! But we understand if you
feel the urge to ask for directions now and then. . .
JVC
MOBILE
ENTERTAINMENT
mobile.jvc.com
Kicks for Free
This summer, tickets to metals biggest tour will cost nothing. Will this
unprecedented move have Ozzfest flying high again, oris it a suicide solution?
BY DAVID PEISNER
After several years of watching Ozzfest's profits
dwindle, Sharon Osbourne decided on a novel new
approach. In February she and husband Ozzy,
who launched the multiband metal tour in 1996,
stunned the music industry when they announced that
ticl<ets to this summer's edition would be free.
"Every year, ticket prices go up and there's nothing you can do," she
explains. "It's the cost of fuel, lights, sound, trucking. So you raise the
ticket price. We can't keep doing it. So we turned around and said, 'Fuck it.
we'll charge nothing, get some sponsors to underwrite it, and get bands
who really want to give something back to the fans to work for free."
Small and midlevel metal acts, including Lamb of God, Hatebreed,
Lordi, and Nick Oliveri and the Mondo Generator, will fill out this
summer's lineup, with Ozzy himself headlining. Sponsors, for
their part, will be granted unprecedented access to concertgoers.
"We wanted the sponsors to be the winner, as far as putting
the power in their hands to hook up fans," says Caroline Burruss,
a sponsorship vice president at Live Nation, the tour's promoter.
ILLUSTRATION BY DAMIAN DEMARTINO
WMW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 33
C iterial
Metal institution: Mark Morton and the rest of Lamb of Cod at 2004's not-free Ozzfest
What this will mean in practical terms
is that the tour's three main sponsors-
Monster Energy Drink, Jagermeister,
and music retailer FY.E.— will offer
codes for free tickets to anyone who
registers on their respective websites.
Additional ticket codes will be
distributed with the purchase of Ozzy's
new CD, in four- and eight-packs of
Monster, and with an f\Y.E. preferred
buyer's card, as well as at lagermeister-
sponsored events. As for fans who
want to walk up and buy a ticket the
day of the show, well...at press time
Ozzfest was still figuring out how that's
going to work.
while the idea of a free tour sounds
great, there are skeptics. "You w\[[
pay ten dollars for parking. Five for a
water, eight to ten for a beer, 40 dol-
lars for a shirt," read one post on the
popular metal website Blabbermouth,
net. "1 wrill bet they raise the prices of
everything."
"Absolutely not," Osbourne insists.
"We're cutting the price of our merch
all along the line, and concessions will
be exactly the same price as for every
other Live Nation show."
In addition to questions about the
ticketing particulars, there have also
been concerns about security and
whether the relative lack of marquee
names will attract the roughly 17,000
attendees per show that last year's
tour pulled in (one sponsor predicts
crowds of 25,000 to 40,000). Even
Osbourne admits that within the
music biz, people are rooting for
this experiment to fail, but it's the
implication that Freefest might
lead to chaos and violence that
rankles her. "I've heard the most
disgraceful comments you could ever
imagine— that we're getting the scum
coming to our shows because it's
free," she says. "I wonder if you're
going to get the scum at the [Live
Earth] global warming shows because
they're free."
"People in the industry don't
like that it's a free show, because it
sends the wrong message," says Gary
Bongiovanni, editor-in-chief of Pollstar.
"This is a show that's worth money, and
people should pay for it. It's cheapening
the product by giving it away for free."
"That's bullshit," Osbourne says.
"The Stones played
for two million people for
free. Did that devalue
them? Obviously not."
SHARON OSBOURNE
The Rolling Stones can go to Brazil
and perform to two million people for
free. Did that devalue them? Obviously
not." She maintains that the industry's
resistance stems largely from the
fact that she has convinced bands to
play for nothing.
"Band fees are getting ridiculous,"
she says. "Bands that go on h>efore
Ozzy have been earning more than
Ozzy For the last three years, we
haven't made money, and not because
of lower ticket sales. It's the cost of
bands. Agents are asking too much.
Managers are asking too much. People
are picking on us because the fucking
agents are not getting any commission
from this tour. We paid System of a
Down $350,000 per show last year. So
add that up over 25 shows and see
what an agent would earn."
In addition to eliminating talent
fees, Osbourne has also streamlined
much of Ozzfest's production budget.
("At the end of the day, no kid goes
home and says, 'I'm going back to see
that light show,'" she says.) But even
with the spending cuts, Bongiovanni
is not convinced that Ozzfest's
business model will work. "If the tour
is successful, they maybe break even.
That's about as good as it's going to
get," he says. 'There's just not enough
money floating around out there."
Osbourne agrees Ozzfest is unlikely
to turn a profit this year, but maintains
that wnth bigger sponsors kicking in
more money, the idea might catch
on: "This isn't going to become a
model; it's not going to change the
touring industry. But it could become
something that could happen on a
regular basis."
If so, that might have a chilling
effect on some bands' ability to score
well-paying gigs. With CD sales in
an industryviride free fall, for many
artists, touring represents their primary
income source. If Freefest is successful,
more tour promoters may reconsider
how— or even if— they'll pay bands.
Mark Morton, guitarist for Lamb
of Cod, was happy to sign on for this
summer's Ozzfest, largely for the
exposure (his band plays right before
Ozzy on the main stage), but he admits
he's wary about the future. "We've got
a dozen people that tour with us, two
buses, a tractor trailer— it's not like we
can just cruise around to every church
picnic and play for free," he says. "If
the music industry changes to where
bands have to ride around playing
free shows for the rest of their career,
I might have to go back to putting
roofs on houses."
Great
Moments in
Freedom
"FREE BIRD" RELEASED
OPRAH GIVES AWAY CARS
Citi /AAdvantage cardmember exclusive
TICKETS ON SALE NOW!
Traveling Through Life
FESTIVAL SERIES
Virgin Festival
By Virgin Mobile
August 4th-5th
3 Cities. 3 Festivals. 3 Journeys. 1 Card.
Citi7A%ivantage cardmembers can purchase tickets to
these festivals and other events at
PRIVATEPASS.CITI.COM
Ticket limit per account varies by festival. See www.pritvatpass.ctti.com for details.
American Airlines reserves the right to change AAdvantage"' program rules al any lime wilhoul notice, and to end the AAdvanlage* program upon six months notice Amencan is nol responsible for products or services
offered b y other participating companies
For complete AAdvantage program details, fees, rules, and restrictions (including mileage earning limitations) vtsit www.aa com/aatfvanlagB.
AAdvantage and AAdvantage wrih Scissor Eagle are registered trademarks of American Airlines Inc.
Citibank is not responsible for products or services offered by ott>er companies
I&2007 Citibartic (Soulti Dakota), N.A Ciri and Citi Arc Design are registered service marks of Citigroup Inc.
mm-
Thrill your mouth.
1 calories p«r mint
Take refreshment to new heights with
intensely enjoyable Tic Tac' Bold!
I ! RRERO
The Inquisition
Young Jeezy
BY DAVID PEISNER
The offices of Young Jeezy's Corporate Thugz Entertainment live up to their
name: Tucked into an industrial park on Atlanta's west side, the workplace is sterile
save for the dozen or so intimidating characters lounging around. "In spite of all the
gang members you see," says Jeezy (Jay Jenkins), 29, with a raspy laugh, "this is a real
business." And with two platinum albums— 2005's Let's Cet It: Thug Motivation loi and
last year's The Inspiration— as well as Cold Summer, the just-released record by his USDA crew,
business is good. Of course, this has only stoked the haters who claim he's a minor talent on the
mic with a major talent for self-promotion. What does the Snowman have to say for himself?
What are your greatest strengths as a rapper?
My greatest strengths are as a hustler I understand
both worlds: 1 can sit down and have a marketing
meeting with L.A. (Reidl and the Def Jam team, then
leave back out that door and go to Harlem and be
with my homeboys. I ain't want to pay to see a nigga
because he can rap good— you're not into the skills,
you're into his mind state. So rap your ass off— and
when you realize that making an album is 5 percent of
the business, then you understand that shit is nothing.
You know how many people made an album today?
Does it bother you when people say you're not a
great lyridst?
Who gives a fuck? We selling records! When you get
done, we'll line our bank accounts up and see what's
cracking. I try to have as much fun in the booth as
I can, to style a little bit, but it ain't about that to
me. My whole goal is to touch the hearts of men.
The first USDA single is "White Girl," yet another
song about coke. Do you worry about being
pigeonholed as a one-trick pony?
I came in who 1 was, and I'm gonna remain that
person. I ain't ashamed of that
SEM
shit. But I'm gonna grow. I'm gonna do better I'm
gonna do different things.
Do you thinl( your songs glamorize drug dealing?
I wouldn't say that. Because the things I say mean
so much to so many people. I'll take you around the ;
corner right now and you'd think I was Muhammad ■;
All or something.
But does that Justify everything?
Well, do you please the people who love you and buy
your shit, or do you try to please the people that
don't understand your world and don't really give a
fuck? What can I rap about? I'm not a plumber, I can't
rap about pipes. I'm not a roofer, I can't rap about
houses. I am who I am. So when is it not cool to be
you no more? You've gotta give a person a chance to
grow on their own time. On the third album, I could
see somebody questioning something, but you ain't
give me a chance to really grow.
On The Inspiration'i "Bury Me a C," you say, "Lonl
forgive me for every gram I sold, every Clock I
popped, every rock I shopped." Are you sorry for
the path you've taken?
Naw. I just don't think I said enough times
that what I did wasn't right. I'm not igno-
rant. I did what I had to. My sister went
to college, other motherfuckers made it
out of high school; I didn't do none of
that. I was in jail every other week, a
shoot-out every other day And I made
it. You can't take that away from me.
If you worked to make it off the streets,
why do you still hang there?
What else would I do? I still want to be
able to go back to my block. Because if you
can't be around the people that raised you,
the older homies that taught you, the niggas you
had shoot-outs with, the broads you wanted to hit
but couldn't back then— if you can't go home, you
can't go nowhere. They're just happy to see me. I
need to worry about these motherfuckers out here.
[Points outside his office] That's why I'm strapped.
My whole goal
is to touch the
hearts of men.
On "I Luv It," you rhyme, "I live for the moment.
Lord knows I'm gon' die / And when I get to
hell. Lord knows I'm gon' fry." Do you really
believe that?
I don't really like to get into that shit,
but I've fucked up a lot of people's
lives. I can make sure niggas'
kids got school clothes
and Christmases. I'm in a
position to do that. But
you can't tell nobody's
mama, if her baby ain't
here no more; you can't
change that. But some-
time you gotta pay.
I just wanna know
how I gotta pay.
I
I
ISE
Time Out of Mind
Three new albums offer visions of the future, but are any of
them realistic? And how do they compare with the grandpappy
of dystopian discs, Rush's 2772? The New York Times' futurist-in-
residence— it is too a job!— Michael Rogers weighs in.
RUSH
2112
CONCEPT: After losing a space war in 2062, Earth falls under
the oppressive rule of the alien priests of Syrinx, who censor art
and music. One day in 2112, a human finds a guitar and starts
to play. The aliens smash his ax and an even bigger space war
ensues! FUTURIST SAYS: "The narrative is fabulous. But the
anti-art, religion-driven autocracy is similar to what we have
on Earth now. If that continues, we'll destroy ourselves before
we achieve the interstellar travel that's implied here." WE SAY:
No guitars? Aliens who sing like someone set their phasers to
"castrate"? Cancel that appointment at the cryogenics lab.
NINE INCH NAILS
Year Zero
CONCEPT: Terrorists plant a dirty bomb at the 2009 Oscars and
the U.S. retaliates with nuclear strikes against Iran and North
Korea, kicking off Worid War III. The government spikes our
water supply with a drug it claims negates the effects of bioter-
rorism. FUTURIST SAYS: "The international scenarios are quite
plausible. It's unlikely that terrorists could get a dirty bomb into
the theater, but that's exactly what a good jihadist would aim
for." WE SAY: SiUy Trent-bombs don't make it to the Oscars!
KLAXONS
Myths of the Near Future
CONCEPT: The good news: These nii-ravin', glow-stick-wavin'
Brits claim this loose narrative is the first part of a three-album
cycle. The bad news: Thanks to the band's belief in psychic Edgar
Cayce's theory that the apocalypse will arrive in 2012, there
isn't much future to sing about. FUTURIST SAYS: "I think 2012
is definitely eariy for the world to t>e ending, but Klaxons get
bonus points for bringing raves back. We forget how often the
future repeats the past." WE SAY: If raves are truly coming back
into style, these are gonna be five long years.
The Spin
20
Ranking
on Pop
Culture
Since 1998
BY DAVE ITZKOFF
AMERICAN IDOL IN CHINA Let us know when they
eliminate the first 32 million contestants
SATELLITE PARTY
Ultra Payloaded
CONCEPT: A group of environmentalists and musicians (and Fergie)
resolve to stop global warming. They have a party aboard a space
station and, somehow, Jim Morrison shows up. He sings a song and
tells them to do something about the melting ice caps. Or...some-
thing. Hey, remember "Mountain Song"? FUTURIST SAYS: "Global
warming will be the big issue for the next 20 years. Droughts, floods,
hurricanes, and tornadoes— they'll all get worse. Can rock stars help?
Bono, maybe. Jim Morrison, I'm not so sure about." WE SAY: If the
cover is any indication, people in the future don't know how to use
Photoshop. LANEBKOWN
THE KILLERS AND OASIS REMAKE SCT. PEPPER'S iust a
warm-up for when they rewrite the Bible
[the end of WEEDSHARE.COM Most misleading
website name since dvdbeaver.com
THE HEARTWARMING COMEDY OF KNOCKED UP
The most compelling argument for abstinence
since chlamydia
MTV'S ROCK BAND, THE VIDEO CAME If yOU Can get
them to play your video, you win
THINGS NO ONE WANTS TO SEE AT AL CORE'S
LIVE EARTH CONCERTS Row after row of pnvate jets;
lames Blunt
FORBIDDING PARENTS TO NAME THEIR DAUGHTER
METALLICA Everyone knows it's a boy's name
WEARING YOUR STROKES T-SHIRT THROUGHOUT
THE TRANSFORMERS MOVIE Almost as cool as playing
with Transformers
LEARNING OF THE ROBERT SMITH/ASHLEE SIMPSON
COLLABORATION Turns out boys do cry, after all
UPDATING NANCY DREW FOR THE 21ST CENTURY
In her new mystery, The Case of the Total Bitch Who
Hacked My Facebook Page
THE SECRET ONE-TIME UBERT1NES SHOW At which
Pete Doherty is briefly reunited with his marbles
PAYING FORMER 90210 STARS TO APPEAR IN PLAYCIRL
Please, oh please, let it be loe E. Tata
[ KURT VONNEGUT, R.I.P. Best known, of course, for
his cameo in Back to School
I THE SURPRISE ENDING OF THE PUSSYCAT DOLLS TV
SHOW We never masturbated to a single episode
U2'S SPIDER-MAN BROADWAY MUSICAL Our WTF
sense is tingling
THE JON BON JOVI ACTION FIGURE
Nice package
38 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
ILLUSTRATION BY CAMERON STEWART
INTROOyCIMG
The Power of
Positive Puking
Headbanger/motivational speaker Andrew W.K.
becomes our Life coach for a day byjessicacoen
Existential discussions may
not seem to mix with keg-
stand anthems, but to Andrew
W.K., the relentlessly sweaty
rocker who has advised the
world to both "Party Hard" and
"Party 'Til You Puke," the two go together
like, well, having fun and regurgitating.
While he opens a club in New York,
releases last year's import-only Close Colls
With Brick Walls domestically, and preps
two other albums, our knight in white
denim makes time to share his positive-
thinking philosophies with equally enthu-
siastic audiences on his High-Way Party
Cruiser tour. I'm not afraid to admit I have
issues, and while they're nothing an over-
paid shrink can't tackle, why lie on a musty
couch when I could be guided down the
path to self-improvement by guy who
smashes his own face with cinder blocks?
RELATIONSHIP DRAMA
Even though I adore my otherwise perfect
boyfriend, Ms army of female friends irratlonaUy
infuriates me.
ANDREW SAYS: "Say to yourself, 'I am happy. I love
this man, I love this relationship.'"
IN ACTION: When my boyfriend goes to meet an
ex for drinks, I feel a tantrum coming on. I repeat
Andrew's rainbows-and-warm-fuzzies mantra, occu-
pying my mind just enough to avoid lunatic girl-rage.
SELF-ASSERTION IN THE WORKPLACE
I'm having a rough time getting my coworlcers on
board with a project.
ANDREW SAYS: "Shift your focus and energies
from obsessing over what is bad, and constantly
challenge yourself to find the good element ."
IN ACTION: I go into a tough meeting thinking happy
thoughts, and my enthusiasm is contagious. I emerge
victorious, with key people enlisting in my cause.
CREATIVE STAGNATION
I've got writer's block— no ideas, no motivation.
ANDREW SAYS: "It's your mind's way of telling you
to open up and relax. Give yourself the benefit of the
doubt that you are perfect. You are about to do, in
whatever time it comes, that 'perfect thing.'"
IN ACTION: I quit thinking about creative projects
and instead take more naps. Let's check back in six
months and see where this has gotten me.
1^
The only known shot
of Andrew sitting —at a
speaking engagement,
Austin, Texas, 2007
FINANCIAL WORRIES
I know I owe a lot in taxes, but I'm too paralyzed
by fear to even call my accountant
ANDREW SAYS: "Think, 'Paying this money allows
me to live here.' Don't panic."
IN ACTION: I finally call the bean counter, but
subsequently keep "forgetting" to send him my
documents— clearly, I'm so not panicked I'm down-
right nonchalant.
BODY IMAGE
I need to buy a swimsuit, but I haven't been to ttie
gym since February 2006.
ANDREW SAYS: "Change your expectations of the
ideal. Tell yourself, 'I wanted to look like I look, or
else I wouldn't look this way.'"
IN ACTION: I try on a fetching bikini and actually like
what I see in the mirror, even the mushy spots. But
thanks to the good folks at the IRS, it's gonna take
more than a pep talk to make this purchase a reality.
MORE WITH THE BODY IMAGE
I haven't been to the gym since February 2006.
ANDREW SAYS: "Shift your attitude from 'I need
to' to 'I want to.' The motivation should come from
within; if it's external, you put it off."
IN ACTION: At the gym, I tell myself that I want to
take care of my body, but not even Andrew W.K.
can ease the pain caused by an unforgiving
spinning-bike seat.
Buzzcatcher
UNDER THE RADAR AND
BLASTING FROM OUR OFFICES
Black Tie Revue
WHO: Boys next door (if you live in
Pittsburgh) toss off ebullient guitar pop
highlighted by an overactive organ and
loaded with choruses that are never less
than infectious, latest: Code Fun (Cear-
head) for fans of: Weezer, Phantom Planet
Handsome Furs
WHO: Wolf Parade's Dan Boeckner got
together with his fiancee, Alexei Perry, and
the world's most realistic-sounding drum
machine, and created songs to evoke those
days when everything is perfect, but you're
inexplicably depressed anyway. The anti-
Mates of State. LATEST: Plague Park (Sub
Pop) for fans OF; Arcade Fire, Bryan Ferry
David Vandervelde
WHO: Though he began his career scoring
films, the Chicago-based singer/songwriter's
tunes are not background music; they're
rambling stories about the lonely and the
stoned, latest: The Moonstotion House
Band (Secretly Canadian) for fans OF:
Wilco, Jonathan Richman
Simian Mobile Disco
WHO: James Ford and Jas Shaw used to be in
the early-'oos Brit dance-rock group Simian,
for whom they crafted anthemic clumps
of druggy magic. These days, they're more
interested in building gloriously noisy disco
creations for the likes of Muse, Klaxons,
and now, themselves, latest: Attack Decoy
Sustain Release (Wichita) for fans of: LCD
Soundsystem, the Co! Team
The Teeth 4/
WHO: This Philadelphia quartet takes the
hookiness and sexiness of classic Britrock
and shoots it through with Midwestern
ruggedness and moody psychedelia.
LATEST: You'fe My Lover Now (Park the Van)
FOR FANS OF: The Kinks, the Shins
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 41
ISE
i
In My Room
J Mascis
The once and future
Dinosaur Jr. leader invites
us into his living room
1J MASCIS JAZZMASTER GUITAR
"I designed this with Fender; my signature's on
the headstock. The first guitar I got was a
Jazzmaster— I wanted a Strat but coulo. .'t afford it.
The store was called Slimy Bob's Guitar Rip-off."
2 ACE FREHLEY DOLL '1 got that in 1990.
maybe, in Australia. I traded some T-shirts for it.
Growing up, I was into punk rock and didn't like
Kiss, but my friend in college turned me on to them,
and I got into Ace's guitar playing."
3 CAPTAIN SCARLET DVDs "i was obsessed
with the show as a kid. Captain Scarlet and
Captain Black somefKiw get irradiated, and Black
turns into a bad guy The Mysterons are pissed aliens
who want to destroy Earth."
4
STEINWAY PIANO "it's from 1889 or some-
thing. 1 only play it once in a while or when I'm
recording other bands here."
STONY BENNETT LITHOGRAPH That was
my high point and low point in showbiz all at
once. 1 got to play 'St. James Infirmary' with
him for MTV Unplugged, but when they aired it, they
cut me out. So he gave me this print of one of his
paintings and wrote me a nice note."
6 PHOTO OF "LIVING SAINT "AMMA
"She goes on tour like a band, hugging people.
You get a ticket and a number to hug her. In
India she'll hug, like, 20,000 people a day. Some
people think her hugs can be healing— she once
healed this leper by licking the pus out of his sores."
LIFECYCLE "1 use it, but I don't like it. It's the
least offensive form of exercise, I guess, 'cause
you can watch TV."
DEEP WOUND SWEATER 'Deep Wound was
my hardcore band in high school This was the
only sweater my mom ever made for me."
9 DYSON VACUUM "I was on a plane in '91
going to London, and the Dyson guy was on the
TV. I got really obsessed. When I landed, 1 went
to see Kevin Shields of My Bloody Valentine, and he
had one. Ten years later I already had two vacuums,
and Dyson finally got the license to put them out here.
But they made a purple one for pet hair, and 1 had to
have it. It's bulletproof— you can shoot it."
m SONIC YOUTH/DINOSAUR FLYER
1 1 I That was designed by Maura Jasper, who
I ^0 did our first three album covers. I think that's
from 1985, and the show never even happened.
I don't remember why." stfve kanxu
42 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
7
8
! ■
MORE ABOUT J MASCIS
In addition to being a veritable museum of indie
rock and the childhood home of Uma Thurman,
Mascis' purple-shuttered Amherst pad served ^ *
as the studio for Beyond (Fat Possum), the first
Dinosaur Jr. record in 18 years to feature the
once-disgruntled Lou Bariow. So was it just like "^""^
old times? "Not really," J shrugs. "New times." ^
SUGGESTIVE SUMMER READING
SEXY STORIES INSPIRED BY THE SOCIAL COMMENTARY OF SVEDKA_GRL
FROM CHRONICLE BOOKS AND SVEDKA. VOTED #1 VODKA OF 2033.
AVAILABLE EVERYWHERE BOOKS ARE SOLD.
gffiH CHRONICLE BOOKS
bonnoroo r-
STIVAL • a007 . A .A
MusidS, Am
ON SALE NOWl
17, 2007 •MANCHESTER,
' THE POLICE • TOOL • WIDESPREAD PANIC • THE WHITE STRIPES • BEN HARPER & the innocent criminals
if WILCO • THE FLAMING LIPS • MANU CHAO radio bemha sound systcm • THE STRING CHEESE INCIDENT
^ FRANZ FERDINAND • ORNEHE COLEMAN • BOB WEIR & RATDOG • DAMIEN RICE • WEEN
GOV'T MULE • ZIGGY MARLEY • THE DECEMBERISTS • THE ROOTS • KINGS OF LEON
MICHAEL FRANTI & spearhead • WOLFMOTHER • REGINA SPEKTOR • THE BIACK KEYS
LEWIS BLACK & FRIENDS • GALAaiC • DJ SHADOW • GILUAN WELCH • SPOON
DAVE AHELL • KELLER WILUAMS (WMD'S) • SASHA & JOHN DIGV^TEED • STS9 • DAVID CROSS
OLD CROW MEDICINE SHOW • NORTH MISSISSIPPI ALISTARS • THE HOLD STEADY
LILY ALLEN • FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE • HOT TUNA • FEIST • HOT CHIP • JOHN BUTLER TRIO • EL-P
RALPH STANLEY athe ojnch mountain boys • AESOP ROCK • THE RICHARD THOMPSON BAND
DIERKS BENTLEY • JAMES BLOOD ULMER • XAVIER RUDD • DAVID BROMBERG AND ANGEL BAND
GOGOL BORDELLO JUNIOR BROWN • TORTOISE • T-BONE BURNEH • MAVIS STAPLES • CLUTCH
PETE YORN • COLD WAR KIDS • FUGHT OF THE CONCHORDS • DR. DOG • PAOLO NUTINI
BRAZIUAN GIRLS • RX BANDITS • THE NIGHTWATCHMAN • THE SLIP • GIRL TALK • RAILROAD EARTH
MARTHA WAINWRIGHT • YARD DOGS ROAD SHOW • RODRIGO Y GABRIELA • ANNUALS
TEA LEAF GREEN • SAM ROBERTS BAND • THE NATIONAL • ELVIS PERKINS in deariand
CHARUE LOUVIN • SONYA KITCHELL • MUTE MATH • THE NEW ORLEANS KLEZMER ALLSTARS
APOLLO SUNSHINE • WILD MAGNOUAS mardi gras Indians • UNCLE EARL • THE LIHLE ONES
BLACK ANGELS • RYAN SHAW
ANGEL & THE LOVE MONGBts • BANG BANG BANG • DAVE BARNES • BENZOS • THE BISCUIT BURNERS • PIETA BROWN
CAGE THE ELEPHANT • SAM CHAMPION • CHRISTABEL andthex>ns • ROCCO DELUCA (SOLO) • DIXIE DIRT • DUBCONSCIOUS
THE DYNAMITES featuring charieswaixer • PIERS FACCINI • FAVOURITE SONS • FICTION PLANE • TIM FITE • HAALE • JESCOE
AlEXA RAY JOEL • LANGHORNE SUM • MANCHESTER ORCHESTRA • JENNIFER NICELEY • BRANDY ROBINSON
SALVADOR SANTANA BAND • JONAH SMITH • SMOKIN' DAVE & the premo dopes • JESSE SYKES &theswsthb(eafibi
TENDERHOOKS • TIN CUP PROPHETTE • THE V/ESTSIDE DAREDEVILS • THE V/HIGS
MORE ARTISTS TO BE ANNOUNCEDI
Check for Bonnoroo 2007 updates at www.bonnaroo.com
LIVE WEBCAST
I Coleman
TTtm Outdoor Compdny
rial
1 DO YOU SHOOT THEM IN
THE AIRHEAD?
Iftheundeadever
take over, what will
become of our stars?
Topps' Hollywood
Zombies trading cards
imagine what reanimated
spotlight hounds like Paris
Hilton and Hulk Hogan 4|
might look like. Scary. _^
The
Honor
Roll
These are a few
of our favorite
things
ROBO-RAGA
Developed by students at the University of
Pennsylvania, the RAV14ot nnimics Beatles-beguil-
ing sitar hero Ravi Shankar's string-plucking style and
improvisation methods. No vword on whether it will sire a
NORAH-Bot that plays lite jazz.
ABURY GOODTIME
Glastonbury Festival has become the most storied
of European rock festivals. Director Julien Temple's
Glastonbury (THINKFilm), on DVD, features performances
from the likes of the Velvet Underground (above), the
White Stripes, and the Kinks. Bonus: commentary by
quick-witted Britpop dandy larvis Cocker.
3
PALE AND SOBER
Driving drunk in a convertible in the
desert is a bad idea. Avoid a DUI and
melanoma with Urban Junkie's alcohol
breath and UV warning tester.
/ NEVER MINDTHE
*♦ CROSS-STITCH
Punks have always loved needles (and
safety pins), and now they can get
their hookup in a safer
(not to mention
more grand-
motherly)
fashion with two
books. Punk Knits
(Stewart, Tabori
& Chang) and
Pretty In Punk
(Chronicle Books).
ON THE ROAD
5 In rapid succession,
K.Thor Jensen lost
his job, his girlfriend,
and his apartment,
and then September
1 1 happened, so he took
off on a Greyhound bus to
crisscross the country. Red
Eye, Black Eye (Alternative
Comics) beautifully captures
his misadventures.
Breaking Out
Gaspard Auge and
Xavier de Rosnay,
photographed for Spin
in New York City,
March 29, 2007
Justice
MetaUica-lovin' French electro duo are— how you say?— /e merde
Bummed by the weak coffee
at a New York diner far from
home, the two Frenchmen
who call themselves Justice
need a jolt. The more talkative
one— a spindly 24-year old
in a black leather jacket named Xavier de
Rosnay— flags down a waiter to order a
Coke and an espresso. The other, Gaspard
Auge, 27, stabs a fried egg and launches
into a riff deriding current dance fare as
tcx> strict, cold, and clinical. "Most elec-
tronic music is too behaved" ftie says, yolk
oozing over his plate.
Raw and combative as their own music
may be — they mischievously take a page
out of Prince's playbook by christening
their American debut the unpronounce-
able glyph t— Justice themselves are quite
well behaved. They talk in hushed tones
and with the comic air of apology that sur-
rounds foreigners using a language they
only kind of know. The Paris natives started
off playing in Nirvana and Metallica cover
bands— "Really bad cover bands," Auge
clarifies sheepishly— but they were equally
enthralled by the synthetic racket of the
Chemical Brothers, Basement Jaxx, and
above alt, a couple of hometown hommes
made good. "Daft Punk were the most
important act in French music," gushes de
Rosnay. "They were big for people like us,
who didn't know the history |of the genre].
They helped bring us to electronic music."
FAST FACTS
-> De Rosnay and Auge
first bonded over their
love of Buggies, of
"Video Killed the Radio
Star" fame.
Seeking a change of
scenery to record the
new album, the duo
moved from de Rosna/s
bedroom to his bas«-
imnt "It's not really a
studio," he admits. "It's
more like a cave with a
computer in it."
True to the philosophy of their label,
Ed Banger Records, a Parisian concern
with a head for the flashing lights of discos-
and the thrashing nights of rock clubs,
"Waters of Nazareth" posits menacing
synthesizer swells over thwacking
beats, while "Phantom" sounds like—
surprise!— an overcaffeinated metal-
head's idea of techno. When he's asked
what sets Justice apart from the countless
other acts bringing rock scruffiness to the
dance floor, de Rosnay's accent proves
too thick to understand, so he ends
up scrawling two words on a notepad:
"baroque " and " apocalypse." Even if they
don't necessarily answer the question, he
smiles, pleased at how the words signify
his sound and the happy accidents that
arise when twiddling with electronic
gear. ""As long as you have ideas,"' he says,
"you can do anything you want."
BY ANDYBATTAGLIA
PHOTOGRAPH BY MATTHEW SALACUSE
m
Breaking Out
Voxtrot
Angry-twee Texans battle technology... using computers!
Ramesh Srivastava, leader
of Austin, Texas quintet
Voxtrot, is a man in conflict.
You might not hear it in his
music— a confident fusion of
post-punk and breezy piano
pop— but there's a battle of Fight C/ub-ian
proportions raging between two halves of
the 24-year-old singer/guitarist.
In one corner is the affable Srivastava,
who is unfailingly polite to strangers bear-
ing tape recorders and notebooks. In the
other is the "miserable fuck" and "tireless
bore" he describes in the lyrics to "Kid
Cloves." "I was so stressed out making this
record that there weren't many other ways
to say it," he says. After early EPs turned
Srivastava and his bandmates— Mitch
Calvert (guitar), Jared Van Fleet (keytxjards),
Jason Chronis (bass), and Matt Simon
(drums)— into everybody's new MySpace
friends, the sessions for their self-titled
debut album were plagued by an overly
assertive Internet fan club. "I read ei'efy-
thing people said about us online," says
Srivastava. "All the hype and expectation
spun out of control. It became an interactive
experience, like Snakes on a Plane."
But while a certain part of him has had
it «nth all the motherfucking blogs on
the motherfucking blogosphere, another
part actually publishes one (thevoxtrot
kid.blogspot.com), wherein he rails
against...blogs.
FAST FACTS
Amazingly, Srivastava
only learned to tune
Ms own guitar this year,
and he still doesn't
know how to change
a string.
-> Keyboardist Van Fleet
sometimes performs
solo as Sparrow House.
-» Srivastava idolizes
Paul McCartney. "The
wusses arc the ones
people relate to." he
confesses.
Eggcellent: Jason
Chronis, Matt Simon,
Mitch Calvert, Ramesh
Srivastava (seated), and
Jared Van Fleet
His rocky relationship with technology
cost him the chance to work with at least
one top producer "I got in a spat with Ken
Nelson, the guy that cfid Coldplay's albums,"
he says, recalling his insistence on recorcfing
to analog tape. "But why should the biggest
producer in the world listen to some punk
kid that doesn't want to use Pro Tools?"
It must have been the frontman's more
congenial half that asked Victor Van Vugt
(Nick Cave, Beth Orton) to produce Voxtrot
(Ptaylouder/Beggars Croup), which retains
the delicate jangle of their early material,
while infusing dance-rock exercises like
"Firecracker" and "Brother in Conflict"
with combustible energy. "Victor helped us
sound more aggressive," says Srivastava,
who admits he'd originally conceived the
group as "the next fey-indie band."
"We used to be twee. Now we're angry."
Actually, they're both.
BY LANE BROWN
PHOTOGRAPH BY REBECCA MILLER
SO JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Bonde Do Role
Meet the Courtney Love of Brazilian baile funk
Breaking Out
Marina Velio, a vision in
bright yellow eye shadow
and messy black bangs,
is shouting something in
Portuguese, stretching a
metallic-blue Lycra-
stirruped leg over the monitor at the edge
of the stage at the Brooklyn club Studio B.
Wrapping the mic chord around her neck
and left wrist, she finds her footing and
reaches her right hand out into the crowd,
which is going appropriately batshit. She
can't seem to get close enough, so she
jumps right in, the dislocated arm from an
ill-advised stage dive a few months back a
nonfactor. Pretty rock-star, considering
Bonde Do Role aren't really a rock band.
Though her antics suggest her idol
Courtney Love, the 22-year-old MC for this
Brazilian trio (pronounced bon-juh doh ho-
lay and named for their favorite hometown
snack shop) actually trades in a mutant strain
of baile funk— a whiplash-inducing mix of
Miami bass, samba drums, Alice in Chains
riffs, and lascivious rapping that originally
hails from the favelas (shantytowns) of
Rio de Janeiro. Hours before this typically
raucous show, Velio recalls her rock'n'roll
roots: "I sold my hair to buy my first guitar.
Two hundred dollars!"
Turns out she wouldn't need the ax-
by 2005, she'd hooked up with beatmaker/
MC Pedro D'Eyrot, 23, and DJ/producer
Rodrigo Corky, 26, in their hometown of
Curitiba to record the genre-hopping tracks
that caught the attention of globe-trotting
DJ Diplo, who released their first EP on his
Mad Decent label. Their debut full-length,
... With Lasers, is out now on Domino. "In
Brazil we have this joke that everything
with the addition of lasers is better," Velio
explains, sort of. "Like, a bottle of water
with lasers: so much better."
As Bonde Do Role prepare to take their
Brazilian mishmash worldwide, many pitfalls
await. Homesickness. Exhaustion. Unagi. "In
November 20O5, Pedro had sushi and went
to the hospital and had his appendix out. In
November 2006, Corky had sushi and went to
the hospital and had his appendix out," says
Velio. "I don't eat Japanese food, but if I do
try it, I have to be sure it's not in November."
BY MELISSA GIANNINI
PHOTOGRAPH BY TIM SOTER
FAST FACTS
Sepultura drummer Igor Cavalan's
three kids— ages three, five, and
eight— sing on "Geteia de Amendoim"
("Peanut Butter and Jelly"), the B-side to
third single "Gasoline."
Gorky's mom does water aerobics to
...With Losers. "She took the CD to the
teacher and said, 'Oh, can you please play
my son's band?'"
ON VELLO: GUESS BY MARCIANO T-SHIRT, S34,0UESS.COM;
NOOKA WATCH, S125, N00KA.COM. ON GORKV: UNINC
HOODIE, S7S. BURTON.COM: QUIKSILVER LIMITED T-SHIRT,
S60, QUIKSILVER.COM: BURTON CAP. S25. BURT0N.COM.
ALL NEW 2007 JEEP PATRIOT. CHOOSE YOUR ADVENTURE. Paved roads or beaten paths. Jeep
standard safety and security features like ESP. ABS. Electronic Roll Mitigation, and available Trail Rated" capability.
%X2 MSRP iy.i Limited as shown, ^23,785. MSRPs exclude tax. 'EPA est. mpg of 26 clly/30 highway for 5-speed manual-equipped ix2 models. Jeep and Trail Rated are registered trademarks
Cr:r
iterial
They used to be about flash and bravado. When did
TOMMY Lee
rockers start looking and acting like everyone else?
V
By David Browne
CHRIS DAUCHTKY
good rock-star
stories lately?
Any outrageous anecdotes of living-large lunacy that only someone with plati-
num albums and a penchant for twisted kicks could inspire? Butch Walker has.
As either a producer or a songwriter, he has put his prints all over records by
Fall Out Boy. Pink, Avril Lavigne, the Donnas, the Academy Is, as well as the
upcoming Von Bandies and Hot Hot Heat albums. And according to him, no one
can top Tommy Lee when it comes to tales of rock'n'roll excess. Just listen:
"We're in the studio lastyear, working on a record, and Tommy comes in and he's pouring
drinks. And he's like, 'Dude, Nine Inch Naib are playing atfuckin' Irvine Meadows! We
gotta go! ItH be radl'And I'm like, 'Dude, we're in Silver Lake. It's five o'clock traffic on a
Friday — well be there by midnight if we leave now. '
"He's like, 'I'm gonna call my friend who has a helicopter!' So we get on our bikes and ride
through the Hollywood Hills. We get to his house and there's all these cop helicopters circling
in the distance, about a mile away. We get in Tommy's car and he's like, 'We gotta hurry!
The cops are trying to get my guy because he parked in Slash's driveway!' And I'm like, 'You
can't park a helicopter in the Hollywood Hills, in a driveway/'
"Tommy is completely unfazed by this. So we take off up the hill. We get to Slash's,
and there are, like, eight cop cars, and they want to write the pilot a ticket. So of course
Tommy gets out, turns on the charm, and seconds later, the cops are getting their pictures
taken with him. We get in the helicopter, take off out of the hilb, and we go right through
downtown L.A., skimming overall the buildings and the traffic. We get to Irvine in 20
minutes and park in the field right next to the concert. We walk in — of course Tommy
knows everybody. After the concert, we take our drinks and get back in the helicopter and
cruise back through downtown L.A., and the pilot starts bobbing and weaving through all
the buildings, doing figure eights. We're like ten feet away from the buildings — it's crazy.
Tommy's like, 'Woo-hoo!'
"We finally end up in the Hills, and the pilot's going, 'Okay, you're going to have to help
me find Slash 's house — all the lights are out.' So we 're sitting there hovering above the
Hollywood Hills, brushing the tops of trees of these mansions, debris flying everywhere,
looking for Slash's driveway! Everything looks the same; everything's got a pool and a
driveway. Tommy is drinking and high-fiving. But we find Slash's house, and we land in the
driveway and get in Tommy's truck and go to his bar down the street and get the pilot fucked
up until six in the morning. We come back and it's daylight. Slash's wife doesn't know why
there's a helicopter in the driveway, so the whole helicopter was toilet papered. "
As Walker relays it, the story is absurd, hilarious, and exactly what one would expect
from the most extroverted member of Motley Criie. (And in case you were wondering,
the pilot did get arrested and was fined for, among other things, landing a helicopter on a
public road.) "Tommy's the consummate example of a rock star," Walker says. "That's not
my version of one, but I'll be damned if it's not the most fun thing in the world to witness."
mow, stop toughing— whether with Lee or
fl^S at him — and think about this for a minute.
Sure, Keith Richards, no stranger to enve-
■ lope-pushing behavior, told a reporter in
April that he'd snorted cocaine mixed with the ashes
of his dad (a statement his manager later dismissed as
a joke). But that remark aside, Walker's story brings up
vital questions, like: Will we ever hear anything remotely
similar emerge from the mouths of any of the hard rock-
ers currently crowding the charts, whether it's Chris
Daughtry or Nickelback or Three Days Grace?
Or better yet, what ever happened to. . .rock stars?
Successful rock musicians exist, sure. But that's
not what we're talking about. A rock star isn't merely
someone who sells a ton of albums or draws people into
arenas. It's someone who can tear up both a stage and
a mansion, someone whose music and wardrobe have
an instantly indefinable style, someone who's funny
and enjoying the ride. Someone you actually would
recognize on the street.
Lately, that type of rock star has been in short supply.
Seemingly overnight, we find ourselves in an era in
which rockers seem woefully generic, as if they've all
gone under the knife to have their charisma surgically
removed. Sure, Gerard Way of My Chemical Romance is
trying his damnedest to take emo to theatrically glammy
new heights, and Jack White's scraggly locks and spifly
duds bring to mind any number of vintage rock heroes.
Hinder, Buckcherry, and Avenged Sevenfold are working
hard to conjure the spirit of Sunset Strip sleaze. But
they're the exceptions. If a member of, say. Blue October
(one million albums sold) was reading this magazine
over your shoulder on a bus, you probably wouldn't even
know it. The only people who seem interested in going
over the top — and loving it — are the walking cartoons
who have competed on those tacky game shows Rock
Star: INXS and Rock Scar: Supernova. It's one thing to
tire of hearing about rock high-life cliches, but is the
antidote a bunch of scrubbed-clean pop punkers who
equate edginess with dating rween starlets? "A lot of
these new bands, they're not into it," says Hinder lead
singer Austin Winkler. "It's a job. They do their thing and
go back to the tour bus and play PlayStation."
Anonymous rockers are, of course, nothing new.
Think back to the early '80s heyday of Styx, Foreigner,
REO Speedwagon, and Journey. Plenty of the new-wave
bands that followed were pretty interchangeable, too:
Could anyone distinguish a Vapor from a Fabulous
Poodle? When they showed up backstage at their
Lollapalooza gigs in 1995, the members of Pavement
were stopped by security guards who didn't believe they
were actually musicians. And let's not even get started
on the late '90s, when it became virtually impossible
to distinguish among Vertical Horizon, Sister Hazel,
Eve 6, and countless other post-grunge leftovers.
But something about the current scenario feels differ-
ent. As similar as Journey and Styx may have sounded, it
was still possible to take a close look and tell which guy
was Steve Perry and which one was Dennis De Young,
both physically and vocally. Now bands without a single
genuine face attached to them — say, Snow Patrol, the
Fray, or Custer — sell out major venues. Rock stars don't
hiave to be party-till-you-puke animals — professionalism
has its merits, too — but could it hurt for some of the
new breed to have personality? In 2006, fans seeking
good oldfangled showmanship onstage paid a premium
to see the Rolling Stones, the Who, Aerosmith, or the
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 59
ROCK STAR! ROCK SM/??
reunited Motley Criie, all of whom ranked among the
top 20 highest-grossing tours of last year. The newest
bands on the list — Nickelback and Coldplay — are
hardly known for their dynamic stage presence. No
wonder Poison and Rage Against the Machine have
returned. When you see them, you'll remember the
hits and the mugs.
Matt Pinfield, the former MTV VJ and current
Sirius satellite radio host, recalls the last time he
witnessed an outrageous rock-star moment — and it
was seven years ago. Making the rounds at a party
at the Playboy Mansion, he stumbled upon two men
getting intimate with two Asian Bunnies. After his
initial embarrassment wore off, Pinfield recognized
the men, drummers for notoriously hard-partying L.A.
bands. (No, he won't say who they were, at least not
on the record.) Without missing a beat, each looked
up and said, "Hey, Mart! How ya doin"?" before getting
back to business.
"It was great," Pinfield rasps, a nostalgic pang evi-
dent in his voice. The following year, Pinfield went to
work as an A&R scout for Columbia Records, where,
among his other tasks, he hoped to discover the next
big arena act. Yet he found few prospects. "There
weren't a ton of new young kids coming through the
door where I said, 'Now, he's going to be a star,'" he
says with a sigh. "It's a lot different now."
Today, everyone seems to be aaing like rock stars:
athletes, rappers, tabloid queens. Sawyer on Lost.
Everyone, that is, except rockers themselves. "We're
the biggest band in the world, and no one knows who
we are," Arcade Fire's Win Butler has said, accord-
ing to a widely circulated letter from their manager
defending the band against charges of overexposure.
Good for them, but is this something to aspire to?
What happened? Did we all overdose on too many
episodes of Behind the Music?
^^^^ ret Michaels Is stIU proud of his band's
^H^^ Behind the Music. "I laugh when I look back
^^^B on it," the frontman for '80s poodle rockers
^^^^r Poison says. "I think, 'Dated a supermodel.'
Check. 'Dated an actress — Pamela [Anderson] .' Check.
'Did drugs and alcohol.' Check. 'Fast-car wrecks."
Check. 'Motorcycle wreck.' Check. When I got done
watching it, I thought, 'Fuck — that rocked.'"
"SLASH'S WIFE
D0ESN7 KNOW WHY
THERE'S A HELICOPTER
IN HER DRIVEWAY/'
Butch Walker
For Michaels, seemingly oblivious to the notion
that he risked other people's lives in the process, the
solution is simple, dude: "We need rockers to step
back up to the fucking plate and say, 'I rock. I'm cool.'
Stop being faceless. If your neighbor is more exciting
than a rock star, why not just go and hang out at your
neighbor's house?"
As a journalist, I've heard plenty of rock-star stories
myself over the years. There was the member of Nine
Inch Nails who preferred his groupies to dress like
French maids. The British legend who decided to
clean up and hired a bodyguard to keep drugs away
from him — and then, bored with that scenario, hired
someone else to get drugs past the bodyguard. The
stripper backstage at the Black Crowes show. When I
went on tour with Kiss in 1996, their roadies filled me
in on "pussy passes," which the crew used to entice
women to follow them behind the barricades, even
if the ladies rarely, if ever, met the band.
"All of a sudden one day, rock went dull," says
Michaels. "It's like they dimmed the lights all the
way down. The record labels turned their backs. So
did the video stations. If it weren't for Kid Rock, I was
starting to think rock hadn't just dimmed; it may have
actually died. He had some balls, and I actually knew
what he looked like." The same, he says, can't be said
of the garage revivalists from earlier this decade: "1
know about Jet and the Vines and the Strokes, but I
still can't completely identify all of them."
What happened? For one thing, Michaels (and
just about everyone else interviewed for this article)
blames the ghost of Kurt Cobain. Cobain was both an
nnti-star and a certifiable star, yet a watered-dowm
version of his sound and image srill lingers over the
landscape. "His depression was real," Michaels says.
"But that depression led a lot of bands to where we
are today. They're faking their depression. Rock'n'roll
is part fantasy and part reality. And a lot of bands
today have lost that. They're allowed to come out
onstage and be energetic, but it's considered uncool
if you act like you're having a good time."
As jarring as it may be to look to a member of
Poison for deep thoughts, Michaels does have a
point. In retrospect, it feels as if the early '90s — a
period that gave us not only Cobain, but also made
icons out of Scott Weiland, Chris Cornell, and Eddie
Vedder — may have been the last stand of the rock star
as we know him. Each knew how to work it, even if
he claimed he wasn't working it. The rise of the boy
bands was one nail in the coffin — even at an early age,
Justin Timberlake had better stage chops and more
star power than his lunkheaded contemporary Fred
Durst. These days, it's women like Amy Winehouse,
Lily Allen, and Lady Sovereign who are exhibiting
more rock-star personality and badassitude than the
men are. John Mayer, guitar hero? Please.
The decline of the CD and the rise of the single
may be a factor, too — rock has been so inextricably
Pop Quiz: Rock Star or Bartender?
Five of these faces front some of today's biggest-seUing rock acts.
Tfie other two mix a swell screwdriver. Can you tett who's who?
60 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
uttuofu9g Buiifoajg 'Xd/tunff uiiuofMg (o) u»qoi30 »nn 'f^uaiun^ u/jsnf ^j) :j»pu3iJoq 'cuoy {jf
Girts, girts, girts (clockwise from
top tefth Motley crews Buckcberry,
Avenged Sevenfold, andHinderare
trying to keep f/ie Sunset Strip
sleaze-rock flame aligtit.
linked with full-length albums that the genre now
Peels as diminished as the format. A few years ago, the
Darkness were touted as a throwback to old-wave the-
atrics and sonics, but few could tell if they were being
earnest or ironic (,Should that even matter? the band
asked). They fizzled after releasing their sophomore
album — casualties, it must be noted, of traditional
rock-star overindulgence. In the MySpace era, "kids
want to feel more in contact with bands and be on
their same level," says Pinfield, thereby subverting the
idea of "stars." Deals struck between rock bands and
corporations — not just tour sponsorships, but other
routes for financial survival — can't be helping: Who
wants to see a lucrative chance to place a song in a
commercial or on an episode of Grey's Anatomy fall
through because of naughty behavior?
But the rise of rap truly signaled the death of one
kind of rock star and the birth of another. Just when
rock stars began to bland out, hip-hop happily rose to
the occasion: The biggest "rock" stars of this decade
arguably have been Eminem and 50 Cent. These days,
anyone in search of living-large wildness will find it
in the rap world, where stars routinely get arrested
and flaunt their status and money onstage and in
bling-filled songs and videos. "Right now," says Butch
Walker, "rap is at the same place where rock'n'roll
was when it became excessive in the late '80s — when
Poison, Bon Jovi, and all those bands had those
videos — all bling and not a lot of substance lyrically
or musically. Band names in the '80s had all these
MORE AT Sf1N.COM Watch rodten teU their
(avorite rodtttar stories at www.spin.coin/rDd(Star
z's and ^s, and it's the same in hip-hop now. Every
hip-hop guy is called Bonzzz with three z's."
Walker himself hasn't exaaly helped matters;
he did, after all, produce the Rock Star: Supernova
album, although he makes no artistic claims for it
and says he did it to work v«th his "bros" Tommy Lee
and Gilby Clarke. But mention Nickelback and Chris
Daughrry, and Walker — who started his career with
late-'80s hair farmers SouthGang, before forming the
glam-pop Marvelous 3 in the late '90s — practically
snorts up the Starbucks he's swigging. "It's fucking
disastrous. That's 'Just add water, make rock star.'
Which is not, to me, a rock star. That's a drinfc."
Onstage at Irving Plaza In New Yark City,
Walker and his band are doing their best
to rock like back in the day. Tall and lanky,
and with long, jet-black hair, he has the
look down, plus the sound: He's playing songs from
The Rise and Fall of Butch Walker and the Let's-Go-
Out-Tonites!, a semi-concept album about a rock
star that was partly inspired by David Bowie's Ziggy
Stardust. Like someone who's studiously examined
YouTube clips of Cheap Trick and Eddie Van Halen in
concert, he flips a guitar pick in the air and catches it
midsong, plays a guitar with two necks, and slowly
scrapes his strings across the mic stand to create an
unholy craaang.
Yet, despite the Walker loyalists who've packed
the club, he's waging an uphill battle. His album has
sold only 18,000 copies since it was released last year,
more proof that anyone looking to reinject traditional
rock values into the culture is up against insurmount-
able odds. Even with a boost from television, the Rock
Star: Supernova album flopped. For future kicks,
we'll probably have to turn to Michaels' upcoming
VH 1 reality show. Rock of Love With Bret Michaels,
an apparent knockoff of Flavor Flav's smash Flavor
of Love. "I'm surrounded by hot women and figuring
out which one will fit in my lifestyle," Michaels sums
up. One episode, he adds, focuses on "one of the most
outrageous parties you will see on TV. After my show
in Vegas, 1 had four beautiful women. One of 'em, I'm
holding her head out of the toilet while she's puking
and telling me she loves me. The other one goes to the
tattoo parlor that night and gets my name tattooed
on the back of her neck. They came to the show, they
rocked, they got hammered."
Backstage at Irving Plaza, there's a lone bottle
of Bacardi, another of vodka, and enough water
bottles to supply the New York City Marathon. Also
in attendance is Shana, a massage therapist who has
been working her magic fingers on Walker and his
band. Shana spends most of her time as the in-house
masseuse at a big Long Island concert hall, and in the
course of servicing many pop-star backs and necks,
she's seen her share of action — like the night the
G-Unit squad performed.
"I was backstage and all of a sudden I heard explo-
sions, and 1 ducked down," she recalls. "And it was
pyro. I looked out, and there were bombs and lights.
It was like a rock show!"
Did she also see and work on, say, Nickelback? "I
think so," she says. She pauses, scrunching up her
face. "I'm not sure. What do they look like?" ^
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 61
iterial
Marilyn »
(or Spin ii
Californii
Dior Horr
jacket-ci
NewYorl
shirt. Re;
Westwoo
White Tri
AFTER A BREAKUP LEFT HIM "COMPLETELY DESTROYED,"
MARILYN MANSON STRIKES BACK WITH A
NEW (VERY YOUNG) MUSE, AN INTENSELY PERSONAL
ALBUM, AND A DISTASTE FOR CROTCH PANELS.
JONATHAN AMES JOURNEYS INTO HIS ART OF DARKNESS.
Photographs by Richard Burbridge
Black metal gates swing o oen, and I steer my car up
Marilyn Manson's driveway. It's a small hill, and there
are od.d, looming trees on both sides, forming a canopy a
scary dark tunnel. Manson lives in Chatsworth, a suburb
of Los Angeles, it's around 9 p.m. on a moonless March
night, and I feel like I'm in a goth version of Sunset Boulevard. Will 1 end up dead
in some swimming pool, like the writer played by William Holden?
I ring the front doorbell of the mansion, which has a grand, old-Hollywood look
to it. The door opens and standing before me is a stocky young man in a dark T-shirt
and loose jeans. There are two rings through his lips.
"Follow me," he says.
I enter the front hall, and about 20 feet away is a large, empty circular room: the
only thing in it is a single white cat. Its shoulders are hunched, and it looks frightened.
My eyes are a bit weak, and I wonder if it's a statue, some kind of joke, so that
Manson's guests are always greeted by a white cat instead of a black one.
"In here," says the man, indicating a door to my left. 1 enter a dark chamber.
"Wait here for Manson," he says, and leaves, closing the door behind him. His man-
ners are grave, formitl, and elegiint, despite his casual dress and seeming youth.
I sit down, and my eyes adjust to the candlelit gloom. I'm in a smallish den with
black-velvet sheets sealed tight over the windows. There's a flat-screen TV, a couch,
an Apple computer, and an old-fashioned Torpedo typewriter The walls are lined
with bookshelves holding hundreds of DVDs, and standing to my right is an eerie
three-foot-high wax statue of Alice in Wonderland. On the table next to me is a
yellowed human skull, the nostrils aaing as a holder for some black pens.
The teeth are rather rotten on the skull, and I think how I haven't been to the dentist
in ten years. Then I wonder nervously if fm being watched on a hidden camera.
Manson's manservant comes back into the room and hands me a clear goblet with
a pinkish liquid. There's no smoke coming off the top, but I feel like there is.
"Absinthe," he says, and stands over me. silent and erect. He's an excellent
manservant, and I appreciate his discipline and freakish behavior
rm not supposed to drink, due to mental problems and mild liver problems, but
I immediately take a sip, like a willing Jonestown suicider The absinthe is chilled,
refreshing, and tastes of licorice. The manservant watches me.
"What's your name?" I ask, bravely.
"Arvin," he says.
We lapse into silence. Sipping my absinthe, I try to gather my thoughts. Tve
spent the last few days reading Manson's excellent autobiography, Googling him,
and listetiing to his music. I review what I know: Manson, bom in 1969, was raised
in Ohio, where he attended a Christian school, which was meant to frighten him
into obedience but had the opposite effect, sort of like the therapy in A Clockwork
Orange gone haywire. His real name is Brian Warner and his grandfather was a
cross-dresser who enjoyed dtldos. His father poured Agent Orange on the jungles of
Vietnam and dressed up as Gene Simmons when he took little Brian to a Kiss concert
in 1979. Manson has put together his ovm philosophy of hedonism, nihilism, and
self-fulfillment, merging such disparate thinkers as Nietzsche and Anton LaVey,
the founder of the Church of Satan. He began his postcollege life as a journalist in
Florida, but then started playing music and broke out nationally, with Trent Reznor
as his mentor, in 1994. Then, in 1999, he was partially blamed for the Columbine
High School shootings, but resuscitated his career with an appearance in Michael
Moore's film Bowling for Columbine. Moore asked him what he would say to the
kids of Columbine, and Manson answered brilliantly, "I wouldn't say a single word
to them. I would listen to what they have to say, and that's what no one did." Now
he's releasing a new album, Eat Me, Drink Me — his first in four years — and will
embark on a co-headlining tour with Slayer in July.
The door swings open and Manson lopes in, carrying his ovm goblet of absinthe.
He's wearing a black T-shirt, black leather pants, and gigantic Frankenstein boots.
He's six-foot-three and looks to be all narrow torso and legs. I'm middle-aged and
completely bald and immediately assess that Manson's black hair is beginning to
thin, probably from multiple dyeings. His face is sweet, and his eyes, without his
usual colored contacts, are kindly.
64 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM _
We Stan to talk, and Manson is sniffling a little. Right away, he starts to tell me
about the breakup of his marriage to burlesque queen Dita Von Teese. They were
together for six years and then, in their seventh year, they got married. "It's the old
cliche," he says. "Marriage changes everything."
The behavior he had manifested for the first six years — such as living like a
vampire — became unacceptable to Von Teese, he says. But he wasn't willing to
give up his vampire's hours. "I'm my most creative between 3 and 5 a.m.," he says.
"That's the way I've always been."
Going to sleep at dawn and rising at dusk was not the only issue of contention,
though. Before they were wed, Manson and Von Teese were never separated for
more than five days; after they got married, he wasn't seeing her three out of every
four weeks, due to her own hectic schedule. Manson is very needy, and with Von
Teese on the road all the time, he started losing his mind. And he started believing
her when she said that the way he lived was wrong.
"But then I realized that what's wrong about me is right," he says. 'To play devil's
advocate — but that doesn't really work, since I'm the devil — people would say
that drugs and alcohol wrecked my marriage. But buyer beware. She said she had
tolerated the lifestyle because she hoped I would change and threatened to leave
if I didn't. I was sleeping on the couch in my own home. I was no longer supposed
to be a rock star. 1 was someone who had to be apologized for. I wasn't prepared
to be alone. I came out of this naked, a featherless bird. 1 needed to get my wings
back by making this record."
WHILE HIS MARRIAGE was disintegrating, Manson met then-19-year-oId actress
Evan Rachel Wood at a party, and a platonic friendship developed. He began to
talk to her about appearing in a film he'd written. Phantasmagoria — The Visions
of Lewis Carroll, concerning the author o( Alice in Wonderland.
At one of their early meerings about the projea, Wood wore heart-shaped glasses
and looked like the movie poster for Stanley Kubrick's Lolita. Seeing her in the
glasses, Manson had what the French would call a coup defoudre — his heart was
pierced. It turned out that Wood, like Manson, is a huge Nabokov fan and had
worn the glasses on purpose, to acknowledge and ironically wink at the subtext
of everything going on — Carroll's long-rumored young-girl fetish, not to men-
tion the 19-year age difference between Manson and herself. (Manson, a great
believer in connections and coincidences, points out that Nabokov translated Adice
in Wonderland into Russian.)
While Manson was separated from Von Teese, his friendship writh Wood eventually
turned erotic. One day the actress was licking a heart-shaped lollipop, and then she
kissed him. He told her she tasted like Valentine's Day and immediately wrote a song
about it, "Putting Holes in Happiness." "She's nothing less than a muse," he says.
Wood now lives «nth Manson, and they collaborated recently on a video for the
single "Heart-Shaped Glasses." It's one of the first videos to use James Cameron's
3-D technology, and Manson was the star and director. It took four days to shoot.
Cameron came to the set when Manson and Wood were filming a love scene and
put himself in the director's chair. Manson tells me that Cameron said to him, "I'll
worry about the sweet spot and you worry about the G-spot."
A few months before, when Manson was wildly depressed over losing Von Teese,
Wood said that she would die for him, that they could die together "It might sound
strange," Manson says, "but this made me want to live." To me, it doesn't soimd
strange. I once attended a goth music festival in Illinois, and one of my chief impres-
sions was that goths are a very romantic people. To them, the dark costumes and
the blood are imbued with romance and beauty — their apocalypse is someone
else's rainbow, is what I'm trying to say.
So Manson, like the goths who follow him, is a romantic, and it's his most
endearing quality.
Or I
J
"THIS ALBUM'S ABOUTWANT-
ING SOMEONE SO BAD YOU
WANT TO DEVOUR THEM."
AFTER ABOUT TWO HOURS of drinking and talking, Manson wants to play Eat
Me, Drink Me. "This album was borne out of depression," he says. "But it's also
about cannibalism in a romantic sense, the idea of wanting someone so bad you
want to devour them."
Before the album started coming together, though, he couldn't make any art for
months; his misery over his failing marriage was consuming him. "I was completely
destroyed," he says. "I had no soul left. I define myself as a person, a human, an
artist, as someone who make things — writing, painting, music — and I couldn't
do anything."
One day he was telling his guitarist and coproducer. Tun Skold, about his heartbreak,
and Skold said, simply, "Why don't you write a song about it?" Manson was shocked
by the suggestion but followed the advice. "It's strange, but it never occurred to me to
work that way," he says. "I've never laid myself out there like I have in these songs."
He puts the CD into the stereo, and it's beautifiil and devastating. Reading the lyrics
as I listen, I think of the album as the love child of Von Teese and Wood, equal parts
despair and joy. It mourns the loss of Von Teese and celebrates Wood's embrace. I
occasionally look up from the lyrics, sneaking peeks at him. His eyes are closed and
the long, thin fingers of his left hand touch his pale temple. At one point, I nearly
start crying — the music and the absinthe are working on me, and I'm thinking of all
my breakups, all that lost love. Then the album is over and Manson says, "You look
like you were moved." I realize that he's been sneaking peeks at me as well.
Arvin, as he has throughout the night, comes in and refills our glasses while
Manson is telling me how all his previous records had been fueled by nihilism and
rage at the world, but then, he says, "I became so deeply depressed, which is different
from being nihilistic. You have nothing to live for. For the first time, I lost hope."
For the first time? I think. I'm shocked by this. I haven't had any hope in years.
Manson goes on to tell me that he's more or less back to his old, strong nihilistic
self. But ail of this disturbs me. Am I darker than Marilyn Manson?
I express to him that being a nihilist is a form of idealism — you don't want to tear
things down if you don't think things could be better somehow — and he agrees. But Tve
never thought that way. Fm a despairist. I don't get angry at the world; I go straight to
sadness. I sometimes secretly hope that man can change, but mostly, I've given up.
I'm rather inebriated and don't want to think that Manson is delusional. So I
say to him, feeling slightly hysterical, "Do you really think, as a nihilist, you can
change things? Change the world?"
He sips his absinthe and says, calmly, "No. I can't change anything."
He goes on to talk about Wood's role in Across t/ie Universe, Julie Taymor's upcoming
impressionistic film featiuing Beatles songs, and he mentions the tide song's famous
refrain: "Nothing's gonna change my world." I tell him that I know that song well — an
old girlfriend put it on a breakup mix tape, and I've wept to it many times.
Manson then tells me he referenced the lyric in his song "Lamb of God" (from
his Holy Wood album), about the death of John Lennon, changing it to: "Nothing's
going to change the world."
I find all of this is very soothing and reassuring. Manson is not delusional, and I
feel less alone. We're of the same mind: There's nothing to be done.
AROUND 2:30 a.m., we head for the kitchen to get more absinthe. It's my first
time in the main part of the house. We walk down the hallway and the white cat,
like Alice's white rabbit, is gone.
In the kitchen, Arvin is putting out some food for Manson — a steak and salad.
Looking at the food, Manson says, "1 have a weight complex. I want to stay skinny,
so I try to eat well. I try to come right up to the edge between healthy and not
healthy." He sips his absinthe. "You have to get your body to the point where germs
are afraid to live."
He pours me some blue absinthe — absinthe, apparently, comes in different
colors — and he tells me that a German distillery is developing a brand just for
him: Mansinthe.
Absinthe, due to its high alcohol content, is not sold in the U.S. Also, it contains
wormwood, which is thought to cause mild hallucinations — and I have noticed, as
the night has worn on, that all sources of light seem to sparkle. Manson tells me
he drinks the stuff because it doesn't fatigue him, and because the long history of
anists — such as Poe, Rimbaud, and Van Gogh — favoring absinthe appeals to him.
We leave the kitchen and walk about the house, which was once owned, he informs
me, by the actress Barbara Stanwyck. The place is pretty much devoid of furniture.
I do spot one chair. Sitting in it is a human skeleton with an animal head.
We go into Manson's music studio, which is littered with equipment and looks
like the lair of a mad scientist. We also visit his painting studio. In the middle of
the room is a 19th-century embalming table that is permanently marked by the
brownish stains of dead bodies.
"I thought I might make love on it," Manson says.
Instead, he recently decided to paint a portrait of Jesus on the table. Manson
wanted the death stains to come through the face of Jesus, as a sort of homage to
the Shroud of 'Ririn.
As I admire his work, he tells me about the art gallery he opened in Hollywood,
the Celebritarian Corporation. The address is 667 Melrose Avenue. "That wasn't
intentional," he says. "My neighbor is a church. They might be 666."
We step outside, and there is a pool in which William Holden could have floated
very nicely. Staring through the trees, I can see the lights of the nearby homes.
"If I was a kid in this neighborhood, I would definitely bug Marilyn Manson," he
says. "That's why I get up on the roof with my pellet gun sometimes, paranoid that
there are intruders."
We go back inside and Manson says, "Arvin will drive you home. You're very
drunk. We don't want you to be killed."
"Thank you," I say.
A PHONE CONVERSATION, MARCH 26, 2007
JONATHAN: Hi, Marilyn.
MANSON: Hey, you got me really drunk last night. That never happens. I was trying
to keep up with you.
JONATHAN: I'm sorry. 1 realize I just called you Marilyn. Is that all right?
MANSON: Anyone who's close to me calls me Manson. Strangely, I've never felt
comfortable introducing myself with a woman's name. For me, the name works
only in its entirety. For brevity's sake, it became easier to call me Manson. Early on,
they called me M, but then Eminem sort of stigmatized that. He actually said — and
we know each other and get along famously — when he was first starting out that he
wanted to be the rap Marilyn Manson. He asked me to sing on his first record, and
I would have, except that the song he asked to me sing was — and this might sound
strange — too misogynistic. It was the one about killing his girlfriend and putting
her in a trunk. It was on a record I could listen to, but it was too over-the-top for
me to associate with. It didn't represent where I was at. First of all, 1 don't drive.
And I wouldn't put a girl in a trunk; that's where 1 keep other stuff. That's my dry,
deadpan humor kicking in.
JONATHAN: What about Trent Reznor? What's the status of your relationship?
MANSON: 1 don't really have an answer for that. Awhile ago, I saw he said something
derogatory about me in the press, and I called him up and said, "Why should we
fight?" I have no hard feelings. He has my former bass player playing for him; that's
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 67
Gallery of the grotesque
(clockwise from left): At a
1999 awards show; one of
Manson's paintings; a 1994
mug shot; his first Spin
cover. 1998
'1 GET UP ON MY ROOF WITH
A PELLET GUN SOMETIMES."
the only thing we have in common. He may be very muscular right now, but I'm a
much more dangerous person.
JONATHAN: What are your sexual fetishes?
HANSON: First and foremost: women's stockings. Stockings are such a fetish for me.
I still wear them onstage. I particularly like translucent ones or skin-tone. 1 associate
them with my eighth-grade Bible teacher. But she was probably wearing pantyhose
with a crotch panel. I also like women's feet. If 1 see a woman with ugly feet, I get
angry. And I like lcx)king at women's shoes in a store, imagining them on a girl.
JONATHAN: I once read this great thing about a shoe fetishist in Krafft-Ebing's
Psychopathia Sexualis. The guy was more in love with his wife's shoes than with
his wife, and he couldn't perform in bed with her. So Krafft-Ebing or some other
doaor told him to nail a shoe over their conjugal bed and to look at the shoe while
he made love to his wife, and maybe then he would be able to perform. 1 always
like thinking of that shoe nailed over the bed.
HANSON: Yeah, if I was a psychiatrist, that's the kind of thing I would prescribe.
That's the kind of doctor I would be!
JONATHAN: Are you close to your parents? I couldn't believe it when I read in your
memoir that your dad would say to your friends, "Have you ever sucked a dick
sweeter than mine?"
HANSON: Yeah, that's my dad. He's still potentially pervened. My parents are retired.
My mom is going through a rough period. I support them. Fm closer to them now.
JONATHAN: You're a good son.
THE FOLLOWING EVENING, Fm performing at a dub in Hollywood called Lai^o.
I'm a writer, but sometimes I do comedy. My friend Fiona Apple has come to see
me and provide support, and thinking of all the weird connections, I recall that
Fiona once covered "Across the Universe." Manson shows up with Evan Rachel
Wood and sits with us. Fiona and Manson have met before, years ago, and are
happy to see one another.
Matison is wearing a fedora and offers me a hit from his flask of absinthe. Having
to perform, I decline. Wood is much more beautiful in person than in the photos
I've seen. She looks like a young Grace Kelly.
Aimee Mann starts the show with a few songs, and then the comedian Patton
Oswalt takes the stage, followed by me. I tell a number of stories and do an extended
monologue on how in high school, after reading a letter in Penthouse magazine
describing such an action, I put a hairbnish up my ass, producing a violent orgasm.
When I get offstage, Manson hugs me and says, "I'm your number one fan! I also
had a hairbrush put up my ass once!"
Afterward, Manson tells Mann how much he admires her music and her role
in The Big Lebowski, a film he worships. Then a bunch of us go to Bar Marmont,
where Manson has secured a VIP table.
Fiona doesn't like the scene and takes to drawring elaborate faces in a journal. The
bar, I observe, is filled with Paris Hilton knockoffs, like fake Rolexes. It occurs to me that
Hilton is a knockoff of some sort. I think of Manson's song "The Beautiful People."
Manson's friend Stanton LaVey, the grandson of Anton LaVey, joins our party and
tells me, "Manson is the most revered Satanist, second only to my grandfather."
Dave Navarro comes over to shake Manson's hand.
I ask Wood what her fetishes are. She looks adoringly at Manson and says, "Boys
in eye makeup are the greatest thing ever — that whole androgynous thing." The
two of them are madly in love. They are beauty and the beast, like Manson's name
personified. Wood used to be in a TV show called y4merican Gothic, and now she's
really living it. About her attraction to androgyny, she explains: "Fve been obsessed
with David Bowie since I was five — that's what started it."
"We have so many mutual obsessions," says Manson, also an enormous Bowie
fan. Then he tells her, "Show him your tattoo."
Wood pulls back her skirt, and on her upper thigh, right next to her adorable red
panties, is a black heart with a lightning bolt inside. "The black heart is for me,"
says Manson, "and the lightning bolt is for Bovrie." He shows me a black heart he
had tattooed on his inner wrist as an expression of his love for her
I then have this poetic thought that if Bowne was the man who fell to earth, then
Manson is his dark mirror — the man who came out of the earth, the suburban earth
of Middle America, vomited out of his Christian-school upbringing, the child of
a Vietnam vet. Manson and his father used to go to a support group for families
affected by Agent Orange. You don't get more grotesquely American than that. You
don't get more American than Marilyn Manson.
My thoughts are interrupted when a shon, squat man approaches Manson and
says, "Hi, Brian." He shakes Manson's hand and walks away. I realize that it's l.ars
Ulrich, the drummer for Metallica. It's like Manson is the Godfether — people keep
coming over to pay their respects, including other rock stars. He says to me, "When-
ever someone wants to aa like they really know me, they call me Brian. But not even
the people I sodomize — and I'm not saying I sodomize Evan — call me Brian."
Then he beckons me to come with him to the bathroom. Arvin materializes,
follows us, and stands guard.
"Want to do drugs?" Manson asks.
"What kind of drugs?" I whine, scared.
"You know what kind of drugs I do," he says, and I think of his runny nose two
nights before.
"I have a flight in the morning," I whimper.
"Come on," he says. "It's rock'n'roll."
I look at Arvin and then follow Manson into the toilet.
A FEW HOURS LATER, the sun is up and I pull into a gas station on my way to the
airport. As I pay for the gas at the register, I see that amid the display of magazines
is a copy of Penthouse with Dita Von Teese on the cover. The coverline reads: see
WHAT manson's MISSING. This is too strange. I buy Penthouse for the first time in
probably 25 years, but I feel a little embarrassed and try to explain my purchase
to the cashier, "I know him. Marilyn Manson."
"Really?" the cashier responds.
I get in my car and open the magazine. Von Teese is certainly very beautiful.
Then I go to the letters section, wondering if there will be any more coincidences,
but I don't see, much to my disappointment, a single letter about hairbrushes going
up anyone's ass. 9
MORE AT SPIN.COM For an exclusive behind-the-scenes video interview with Marilyn
Manson on the set of our photo shoot, log on to www.spin.com/junecover
68 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cri
THE eaUl INTERVIEW
Don't let the fact that she's
hooked up with reigning hit-
makerTimbaland fool you—
Bjork is still as challenging and
inscrutable as ever 'Tm not
trying to go mainstream;
she says. "This is about music,
not jumping on bandwagons."
BY PHOEBE REILLY
If Bjork ever gets irritated by the frequency with which she's referred to as
"elfin," she won't admit it. "How do I feel about being called adorable? I
find it kind of ridiculous, but it doesn't upset me. That would be like taking
the weather personally — I can't control it." Nor can she successfully conceal
her preciousness during lunch in Manhattan. Wearing a hot-pink baby-
doll dress, her right elbow peeking out through a threadbare patch on the
sleeve, she wnggles in her seat like a fidgety child, making it easy to forget
that the 41 -year-old multiplatinum singer is one of the most respected
musicians in the world. And though she's at that age when even controversy-
courting pop stars like Madonna are anxious to reveal their boring, domestic
sides, Bjork remains unapologetically eccentric and even dangerous — she can
throw you to the ground if you get in her way, like she did a Thai reporter in
1996. Bjork is here to talk about Volta, an album that is just as genre-bending
as the five that preceded it, but more aggressive. In fact, this collection of
politicized, up-tempo, beat-heavy songs may be her least adorable yet.
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 71
^ iterial
Why did you decide to work with Timbaland on
this record?
Because I really wanted visceral, physical, strong
music. And he Is definitely a guy who has headspace
for a strong woman — like Missy Elliott. He lets her
be who she is. It's not like she's there with huge tits,
keeping her mouth shut and being sexy. When you go
into the studio with him, it's like, "Drop everything
and do it in the name of music."
Did you want him to help make Volta more
accessible than your previous album, Medulla,
which was essentially a cappella?
I didn't contact him because I was desperate for a
No. 1 hit — probably the contrary. I like his little
quirky tracks that never become singles. Then he
had quite a year with Justin Timberlake and Nelly
Furtado, and then I started reading online that he's
working with people like Coldplay. It worried me — ^"Is
THE
SPIN
INTERVIEW
he working with everybody?" Not that I was being
possessive, but it was important for me that our
little thing would be precious. I'm not trying to go
mainstream. This is about music, not about jumping
on bandwagons.
As someone who takes risks with music,
would it bother you if you were accused of
jumping on a bandwagon?
No. But I am very protective about my records. I
don't want it to look like I just went shopping. What
I'm most concerned about is that the collaboration
comes from a genuine place. That it's organic. It's like
if you started working someplace and you bump into
somebody, and for some weird reason, you click, and
before you know it, you're going to movies together.
You can't control it. I'm quite old-fashioned that way.
In music, I think you can hear it when things are just
added together without any chemistry.
people were synchronizing their breathing with me.
I don't think it's a coincidence that everybody leaves
England: John Lennon, David Bowie, Becks and Posh.
People can't handle it over there. So I said, "Thanks
for the honor, but I'm not interested," and I moved
to Spain for six months, made [ 1997's] Homogenic,
and stepped out of the whole thing.
You started recording and performing when
you were 11. Did you ever have a moment
when you almost broke down and shaved your
head like Britney Spears?
I definitely have sympathy for her, but I don't identify
with her so much, because I had a choice. I could
move away. And she can't. I mean, even though she
can move to Hong Kong or Africa or whatever, she
wouldn't escape it. And that's scary. It was scary to
look at the headlines when she was photographed
without her knickers. There were obviously hundreds
I'm not crazy about rock. It's square-
shaped and very nnuch about not
having nnystery I can't get into it.
Then do you object to television shows like
American Idol that commercialize and sensa-
tionalize the process of becoming a musician?
I don't know. I don't have a TV. Not that I'm against
television — I think it's great. It's just that I've got so
many things to do that sorting out the TV thing is
like number 47 on my list. But reality TV — I think
it's a good thing.
That's surprising. Why?
I get annoyed much less by people in the street.
TVventy years ago the idea of celebrity was some-
body like me. It was assumed that if you got into the
limelight, you were easy access, 24/7. It was sort of
like being a heart surgeon and going to the cinema,
and having people say, "Can I show you my heart?"
You cdways had to say yes. But with reality shows
and characters like Paris Hilton, it's becoming more
complex. I happen to go onstage and 1 happen to sing,
but that doesn't mean I want people to film me when
I go to the bathroom. But some people do want that.
Certain people want to be celebrities, and certain
people will watch them. Reality shows wouldn't exist
if there wasn't a need.
Did your wariness of fame begin after a
deranged fan sent you a mail bomb in 1996
and later killed himself?
It was a combination of things. At that time, I had
lived in England for three years, and I was an A-list
celebrity there. It was me and five other people. It
sounds really bigheaded, but it's just a fact. As a
foreigner, I was kind of flattered. It was like I was
being offered a role in their society: "Will you be the
person we watch and look at?" But I didn't like it.
I felt if I breathed in [inhales deeply], that 100,000
of paparazzi forced in her face, and the headline was
ATTENTION-SEEKING BRITNEY. [Pouses] I'm embar-
rassed because this actually shows how much I've
been following it!
What's your least favorite trend in music?
I'm not crazy about rock, but I've said that for a long,
long time. My stepdad listens to rock, my brother
listens to rock, my son listens to rock. It's a white,
male thing for me. It's square-shaped and Christian.
It's very much about not having mystery. I can't get
into it.
But you were once in a rock band.
I was in a lot of bands, and several times I went
through this thing where you start a band, do an
album, and it gets labeled. My first was "pop-punk"
and the next one was "experimental post-punk," and
then you get stuck in that box. 1 was so determined
when I was 27 and did my first solo record that that
was one hole I wasn't going to fall into.
Were there any hard feelings between you and
the rest of the Sugarcubes when you left the
band and made Debut?
Not really. I mean, not compared to what you hear
from other bands. When the Sugarcubes were formed,
it was a joke. We got drunk and decided to start a
pop band. We were actually surprised that it lasted
as long as it did.
Was it weird to reunite with the band last
November?
No, we've always been friends. When I am in Iceland,
we meet on Tuesdays for lunch and soup. Bad Taste
[the Icelandic label that released the Sugarcubes'
albums] was our baby, and it was on the verge of
bankruptcy, so we decided to do this gig for free and
put all the money into it.
VoUa sounds remarkably different from your
last few albums, which are much quieter.
I always try to be true to how 1 feel. 1 like my album
to have the same mood as it was written in. Most
of my favorite albums are introverted affairs, where
it's not Friday night after four or five cocktails. It's
more like when you are alone in your home reading
a book. My last couple of albums were written in
that sort of situation. But I have a natural cycle that
I'm going through. It can't be summer all the time.
You have to go through autumn and plant seeds and
wait — and then it" s out of your hands, and you become
an extrovert again. I went through an extroverted
period fi-om 1993 to 1997, and this album is a bit like
those [albums].
By extroverted, do you mean that while
recording Debut and Post, you did a lot of
partying?
I wasn't out clubbing every night. But I guess you
could say I was more social.
Ecstasy was such a big part of the electronic
dance music scene. What was your attitude
toward drugs at the time?
I wasn't against it and I wasn't for it. It's not the point.
When I was going to clubs in England in '88 — before
[Ecstasy] became a huge thing — it wasn't so much
about drugs. You would stay up until 6 a.m., but
you would forget to go to the bar and just be high
on music. I'm very into getting high on nature and
not with assistance.
Iceland Is a country where people drink
heavily. Can you hold your liquor?
Yeah. I think it's a Nordic thing. People in cold
countries tend to just go for it, but only on the
weekends. When I was a teenager, you wouldn't
drink in the middle of the week. You wouldn't have
a glass of wine with your meal, because you'd be
an alcoholic. But if you drank a liter of vodka on a
Friday night, you were cool. It's more about having
an out-of-body experience and getting into a trance
and getting rid of everything on your back. Then
you wake up the next morning, and you've left all
the luggage behind.
Your mother is so active in politics that she
once went on a hunger strike to protect the
Icelandic wilderness from a power plant.
When you were young, did she ever try to
enlist your help in her causes?
She has, but she always put me off because she's so
extreme. It's not realistic. It's just making it easier to
ridicule. I was a bit of an anti-activist for a long time
because of that.
What about your new single, "Earth Intruders,"
which has a very martial feel? Was it intended
as a commentary on the Iraq war?
That was written on the airplane when I flew
72 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cri
Cl
Hollywood's like a religion,
and I had s~t on the church floor;
THE Hfflffl INTERVIEW
back from Indonesia. I had been in the area of
the tsunami, and I flew straight to a session with
Timbaland. I was trying to sleep in this uncomfort-
able seat, and I had a dream about a tsunami of
people — millions and millions of ill and poverty-
stricken people without a home — flying across the
Atlantic and marching over to the White House and
putting things right, equalizing a little bit the power
structure on this planet. The marching was the feet
of all those people. It's pretty naive, but it was a
dream. That's my excuse.
Would you be scared to record an album
completely alone?
The majority of the beats on my records I do myself
Most people don't realize that. As an exception I will
get a collaborator, but 90 percent of my albums are
very solitary. Tm editing away on the computer alone.
I love collaborations, because then I can drop the ego.
I don't look at it as this neurotic clinging to others.
I mean, everybody says about Prince, "Oh, he's so
amazing; he plays all the instruments himself" I don't
think of that as a virtue. I'm not dissing Prince — I
think he's great — but the gorgeous thing about
music is that it is such a great form of communication.
That's something us humans are quite clumsy with
a lot of the rime.
Does the destructive potential of technology
ever worry you?
I think it's just the way things are. I think bad things
are going to happen because of it, but so will fantastic
things, and we're going to edit out what we don't like.
Like nuclear energy. We made mistakes with it, and
we figured out it's not a good idea to bomb people,
but maybe it's a good idea to give homes energy. We
learn. It's nature.
What's the biggest misconception people have
about you?
I don't know. I'm used to being misunderstood. It's not
important for me to be imderstood. I think it's actually
Playing a practical yolk at the Oscars, 2001
quite arrogant to expect people to understand you.
Maybe there's a side of me that my friends know
about that people don't see — the fact that I'm the
oldest of my brothers and sisters, and I'm actually a
pretty sensible person.
Do you think people have the impression that
you are not a sensible person? After you wore
that swan dress to the Oscars in 2001, a lot of
people who'd never heard of you before just
thought you were a kook.
I can't believe people are still talking about the swan
dress six years later! It was a joke. I find Hollywood
dress sense very alienating. Obviously, I was sticking
my tongue out at it. One thing nobody mentions is
that I had six eggs vrith me and I distributed them
around the red carpet. And all the lifeguards for the
stars were like, "Sorry, ma'am, you dropped this."
It was hilarious. The weirdest thing is everybody
actually thought I was trying to fit in but that I
somehow got it vin-ong. Does it look like I am trying
to fit in with you? No. I didn't realize how sacred
Hollywood is. It's like a religion, and I had shit on
the church floor.
Both you and your partner, Matthew Barney,
are famous for being challenging, avant-garde
artists. What is daily life at home like with him
and your daughter, Isadora?
1 think it's more regular than people think; let's just
say that. There's definitely a lot of cooking happening.
People are not going to believe it. I know, but I've
always been a bit of a homebody. I had a child at the
age of 20 [son, Sindri], and just when he was getting
big, I got a new one. They're the best companions. I
can't imagine anything better than having a conversa-
tion about giraffes and why they are not blue. 9
DISCOGRAPHY Bjbrk
THE5UGARCUBES
Life's Too
Good -k-k-k
£L£KTRA. 1988
A bunch of alt-rock
dudes from Iceland can't muzzle
Bjork Gudmundsdottir: Her guttural
vocals and rolled r's turn otherwise
standard-issue songs ("Birthday,"
"Mote rc rash") into distinctly
infectious singles.
THE SUGARCUBES
Stick Around
for Joy
ELEKTRA, 1992
Bjork eventually
confessed that the 'Cubes were "not
her kind of music," which probably
explains why their final album
sounds like uninspired B-52's.
AE)ebut
ELEKTRA. 1993
Having ditched a
band and a surname,
27-yearHDld Bjork
unloads her eccentricity on Massive
Attack producer Nellee Hooper.
The oddball "Violently Happy" and
"Human Behaviour" provide a respite
from Seattle's prevailing angst-
mongering.
Post ★★★★
ELEKTRA, 1995
YV^V I Bursting with show-
■. WJ tune-grandeur ("It's
Oh So Quiet"! a mere
three tracks after the grinding, NIN-
channeling opener, "Army of Me,"
Bjork defies predictability to achieve
critical and platinum success.
Telegram
★★★
ELEKTRA, 1997
An eagerness to have
her music interpreted
by a trendy gang of collaborators,
including ex-boyfriend Tricky, led
Bjork to immediately reinvent Post
as a remix album. A few songs are
stripped of their charm, but others,
like "Hyper-ballad," emerge new
and improved.
Homogenic
★ ★★★★
tlEKTRA. 1997
w^ - jL Turning her back
i*t/i.rM^ui on the hype. Bjbrk
flees to Spain to assemble her most
sublime and vulnerable album yet.
Homogenic peaks and trembles with
the precision of an EKG and is just as
life-affirming, especially the chilling
closer, "All Is Full of Love."
Selmasongs
ELEKTRA. 2000
Like her doomed
protagonist in the film
Dancer in the Dark. Bjork manages
to belt out these clever, Vkride-eyed
musical numbers in spite of personal
peril (i.e., rumored on-set clashes
wfith director Lars von Trier).
g^^-;^" Vespertine
r.'T^"j| ELEKTRA. 2001
Her fourth solo
album proceeds with
centripetal force, soaring upward on
the dizzying ballads "Hidden Place"
and "It's Not Up to You" before
landing with minimal fanfare on
Matmos productions like "Heirloom."
f Jg^ Medulla
^-^^^^ ELEKTRA. 2004
^nfHpHj On a cappella tracks
"M^PJ that v>rill definitely
' not get stuck in your
head, the pregnant singer— along
with Mike Patton, Rahzel, and
several choirs— discovers that
the human voice is her fiercest
instrument.
The Music
From Drawing
Restraint 9 -k-k
ONE LITTLE
INDIAN. 2005
Even by Bjork's standards, the
score for the film by her partner,
experimental artist Matthew Barney,
is really weird— though perhaps
totally appropriate for scenes of the
singer bathing with lemons aboard a
whaling ship. P.R.
FOR A FUa REVIEW OF VOtTA. SEE PACE 90
74 JUNE2007WWW.SPIN.COM
A YEAR
AFTER
THEIR
HISTORIC
DEBUT
ARCTIC
MONKEYS
ATTEMPT
SOMETHING
EVEN MORE
HISTORIC:
STICKING
AROUND
BY STEVE
KANDELL
PHOTOGRAPH BY
MICHAEL
GREENBERG
HOW TO
SUDDENLY
BECOME
THE
BIGGEST
BAND
EVER
FOR A LITTLE WHILE,
THEN JUST AS
SUDDENLY
NOT BE,
WITHOUT
LOSING YOUR
BLOODY
MIND
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 77
MEMORIZE THE RULES...THEN IGNORE THEM
So pervasive is the idea that the l<lds today—
with their PlayStations and their MySpaces and
their anesthetization to and impatience for complex
thought — are such lost-cause dolts, any evidence to the
contrary proves electrifying. Geezers breathe a sigh of
relief that all hope may not be lost for society, while
die youth, empovkfered, emerge from their fractious
subcultiu^es to reilly aroimd a common, timeless cause:
Parents just don't understand. This may in pan explain
the events of January 29, 2006.
That was the day the world learned that Arctic
Monkeys' Whatever People Say I Am, That's What I'm
Not had become the fastest-selling debut in British his-
tory, moving 363,735 copies in its first week of release.
Four whip-smart kids from a suburb of Sheffield, barely
out of their teens, had managed to eclipse Oasis and
the freakin' Beades, due not to a calculated marketing
plan, but rather to old-fashioned/newfangled word
of mouth, while the gob-smacked industry sat on the
sidelines, furiously taking notes. Arctic Monkeys' songs
infused rock's most trod-upon lyrical terrain — bored
teens up to no good — with such detail and wit it was as
though no one had ever written about going dancing
before. Music fans young and old, casual and commit-
ted, embraced in the streets, marveling that something
so literate and genuine and organic could make itself
heard above the din.
Then came January 30. The next stage was so in-
evitable the band went on to sing about it themselves,
gleefully, on last April's EP, Who the Fuck Are Arctic
Monkeys?, beating everyone else to the punch: "Bring
on the backlash!"
"It sort of keeps you on your toes a bit, if you know
they're waiting to crucify you," guitarist Jamie Cook
says in a porridge-thick accent, sipping coffee with
singer/ guitarist Alex Turner, drummer Matt Helders,
and bassist Nick O'Malley in a swanky pub in Man-
hattan's West Village on a frigid afternoon. (O'Malley
is the one who looks like he could, if commanded to,
actually grow facial hair.)
"What's the worst that can happen?" shrugs soft-
spoken but razor-tongued Tlimer. "Someone says, '1
didn't like that tune as much as I liked that other one.'"
Arctic Monkeys have done their part to further upset
the natural order of things by releasing a sure-footed
second album. Favourite Worst Nightmare, barely a
year after their debut (which sold a decent but non-Beatiemaniacal 300,000 copies Stateside — a
quarter of its eventual U.K. tally), rather than adhering to the seemingly standard three-yejir
cycle. And though the new album overall is more aggressive and maybe less catchy, judging from
the opening assault, "Brianstorm," and the nimble wordplay of "D Is for Dangerous," there's littie
chance fans won't like these tunes as much. The songs are less provincial, naturally, yet they avoid
the we're-bloated-rock-stars-now pitfalls, or as O'Malley says, songs about "scoping bitches from
your Escalade."
"I think the first record really represented that time, and people were begging for it," TUrner
recalls. "We were talking about our lives in a way that, I suppose, was well executed, and there
was nothing else like it. We nailed it. But we got into this to make records, and we just wanted to
get on with it. We've only got so much time."
"1 think it's good we have to prove ourselves a bit more here," adds Cook. "The British press builds
bands up, and a lot of them aren't shit. You have to go about and prove your charaaer."
The script says Arctic Monkeys will disappear as quickly as they came, squandering their goodwill
with embarrassing tabloid exploits and undercooked attempts to overstay their welcome. ("What
happened before, it can't happen to us again," Cook says, visibly relieved.) But judging from how
these four childhood friends (all of whom are 21) treat their extraordinary circumstances with
ordinary nonchalance, the script is not likely to be followed. They are proving their character every
day. Which begs the question: Who the fuck are Arctic Monkeys?
COR BLIMEY!
The Most Englishes! Bands Ever
^The Bonzo Dog Band
WHO: Playing swing-era jazz and
rock, these '60s dadaists skewered
Englishness in songs like "Hunting
Tigers out in Indiah." Neil Innes went on
to form tfie Beatles-spoofing Rutles.
COME AGAIN? ' Tm a wobbly jelly, you're
a pink blancmange / I'm a slierry trifle,
you're a chocolate sponge" Ifrom "My
Pink Half of the Drainpipe")
Carter the Unstoppable
Sex Machine
WHO: Antic, politically minded London
duo that, despite all the obscure slang
and in-jokes, managed to get a few
records released Stateside in the early
■90s. COME AGAIN? "We've got yardies,
steamers, parasitic cops/Bostik boys
playing chicken in the box" Ifrom "24
Minutes From Tulse Hill")
Cockney Rejects
WHO: Loud and proud of their working-
class world, this '80s London quartet
blurred the line between punk rock and
soccer hooliganism— and take credit for
naming the shouty subgenre Oi. COME
AGAIN? "Oily rag spam / How yer goin'
me ol' china / Well in order mate, innit?/
We're firm-handed, pal" ifrom "The
Greatest Cockney f?ipoff "1
78 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cm
COME FROM
GOOD HOMES
Sheffield, England, is a former steel town that
has spawned acts as varied as Def Leppard, the Human
League, and Pulp. TWenty minutes north is High Green,
a middle-class suburb that birthed Arctic Monkeys,
"njrner and Cook got guitars for Christmas in 2001
and learned to play them in 'Rimer's garage with their
childhood friend Helders and original bassist Andy
Nicholson, who left the band just as Monkeymania
started subsiding last summer. ("There were certain
-i aspects of it he didn't like, to the point where he had to
f: get away" is all Tbrner will say about the departure.)
During and after high school, they'd drive into Sheffield
to clubs like the Leadmill, jumping up and down to the
Strokes and the Libertines, paying careful attention
not only to the music blaring from the PA, but also to
the blokes and nutters jumping up and dovm around
them. They made songs about that and put them on the
Internet for free, and people flipped out. They released
a proper single and it went to No. 1. When they were
the fastest-selling debut act in British chart history,
they were all living at home vrith their mums.
That Himer's father is a music teacher and his mother
teaches German and linguistics makes it unsurprising
that he was a quick study. "She's always been fascinated
by language, and I suppose that rubbed off," he says
of his ability to turn observations of a misspent youth
very much still in progress into deft, rapid-fire lyrics.
Quips like "All the weekend rock stars are in the toilet
practicing their lines" and "Who wants to sleep in the
city that never wakes up?" have made TXimer's acerbic
songwriting the center of the attention paid to his band.
"That makes me feel a bit weird, like, 'Oh shit, maybe
I'm not supposed to be doing it that way,' " he says.
Arctic Monkeys' success has come at a time when
other U.K. bands such as Bloc Party, Kaiser Chiefs,
and the Fratellis have taken off, thus accelerating the
potential for consumer fatigue at home, as well as the
potential for headline-grabbing mudslinging. But the
smart acts aren't taking the bait. "Nowadays, kids in the
schoolyards are learning to play guitar rather than how
to do dance routines, and that's great, but it does flood
the market," says Kaiser Chiefs singer Ricky Wilson.
"Maybe at first you get a bit jealous [of the Monkeys'
ascent], but then you remember there's always been
more than one band in the world. Sure, I want to sell
more records than them, but that doesn't mean you
don't go for a beer at the end of the night."
More than a decade ago, British pop stars were far more polarized — in the national music press,
anyway — by a supposed class war between blue-collar Oasis and well-heeled Blur, but no less a
loudmouth than Noel Gallagher has publicly declared his support for the suburban-bred Monkeys.
Which is not to say they haven't been criticized for having had it too easy. Last year Morrissey
moaned, "They haven't had to work too hard. It's all a bit unnatural; it can't be gratifying. They
haven't been driving up and dovim the Ml [highway] in a van for 15 years."
"Well, we hadn't been driving up and down the Ml," laughs Cook. "He wasn't slagging us off— read
what he actually fucking said. People love [the drama] but. . ."
"But I don't think it's worth getting wound up about," finishes Himer. "It's just fiiimy, innit?"
HAVE A GOOD TIME. ALL THE TIME
Funny now, sure. It's only recently that Alex
Turner has felt comfortable in his role, though, and
he admits that in the past the band sometimes acted
aloof. But they accepted the Brit Awards for Best
British Group and Best British Album in February via
videotaped message... decked out in Village People
and Wizard ofOz costumes, levity that would have been
hard to imagine even a few months earlier. "I think we
were a bit frightened or nervous, so we put up this
defense mechanism," 'Rimer says. "We were a bit bratty."
Reading about themselves in tabloids — Turner was
reportedly spotted at a Cold War Kids show in London
with Kelly Osbourne, despite having been on the other
side of England at the time — was weird at first, but the band are careful about their public face.
"We've always stayed out of the way of getting that kind of attention," says Helders. "We could
have been up-front about doing amazingly stupid things, but [the press] never sees us do them."
Turner claims it's the band members' long shared history that's gotten them through the mayhem,
including the potentially tricky transition from Nicholson to O'Malley, and Kaiser Chiefs' Wilson thinks
that camaraderie is what gives the Monkeys their edge. "The thing about them, which I look for in a band,
is you can just see they're having a good time," he says. "That's when it doesn't look like bullshit."
When it's suggested that the wordiness and Britishness of TUmer's lyrics may be an obstacle to
Arctic Monkeys becoming massive in America, Turner is quick to disagree: "Look at how much
American music is big in England, and everyone gets it. You listen to Eminem and hear a line you
don't understand, so you go and find out what it means. It's more fulfilling that way." O'Malley
and Helders say that Clocks and 40-ouncers were things English kids didn't know about until they
heard songs about them, and Helders offers that the one thing he wants to do before he dies is
shoot a gun at a firing range. "What's stopping you from just turning and shooting the person next
to you?" he wonders. "Or yourself?"
"I don't know," counters "Rimer, egging his friend on. "What's stopping you?"
A month later, Arctic Monkeys are back in England, having just launched their tour. It's days
before the release of Favourite Worst Nightmare, and TUrner is having difficulty summoning the
hand-wringing that people seem to expect from someone following up the fastest-selling debut in his
country's history. "Everything's a good vibe and sunny," TUmer says. But good parenting and close
mates can't be credited for all of his clarity and serenity — is there one piece of advice he's received
that has helped him make sense of the past year and prepare him for more insanity to come?
"Whenever anyone asks that," he says, "I think of when we were getting our picture done with
Ian Brovm of the Stone Roses. The photographer said, 'Oh, can you just turn to your left?' And Ian,
sorta cocky, just turned to me and said, 'Don't turn left for no one.' " ^
The macho men accept a Brit Award in February.
Half Man Half Biscuit
WHO: Absurdist Liverpool garage punks
of the 'SOs whose songs name-checked
such British figures as snooker referee
Len Ganley, magician Ali Bongo, Benny
HiU sidekick Bob Todd, and sportscaster
Dickie Davies. COME AGAIN? "Brian
(i^oore s head looks uncannily like
London Planetarium " (from "Dickie
Davies Eyes"l
The Mace Lads
WHO: Comically lewd louts from
Macclesfield who took pub rock on an
endless bender with raucous grunt-
alongs like "Beer & Sex & Chips n'
Gravy" and "No Sheep til Buxton. " COME
AGAIN? "I couldn't give a rat turd if it's
raining cats and dogs / Will you nick that
fucking bastard and stop hiding in the
bogs" (from "Stoppy Back")
John Otway
WHO: This eccentric singer from
Aylesbury has straddled the line
between sincere and silly long enough
to publish an autobio ICorBaby, That's
Really Me!] and a book of lyrics [Deep
& Meaningless]. COME AGAIN? "From
Amersham to l^lissenden to Wendover to
the Vale of Aylesbury / That's me heading
down the 413" (from "A413 Revisited")
Frank Sidebottom
WHO: He plays cheesy keyboards, wears
a papier-mache head, and alters the
lyrics of songs he covers to mention his
hometown. COME AGAIN? "I go shopping
in Timperley / 'Cause we've got loads of
shops / That's where I do the shopping
for me mum / Five pounds of potatoes
and loads of chops" (from "Born in
Timperley") IRAROBBINS
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 79
Uncrowned have a slick sound,
endorsement deals, a potential
monster hit, and major-label
dreams. Charles Aaron pounds
the pavement with rock's
hungriest unsigned band to find
out why talent and determination
may no longer be enough.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY MISTY KEASLER
IF YOU WERE TO IMAGINE THE SOUNDTRACK
FOR THE DEATH OF THE RECORD INDUSTRY, YOU COULDN'T DO
BETTER THAN AN ACOUSTIC VERSION OF "IKO IKO" PUYED BY A
GRAYING WHITE MAN IN A HAWAIIAN SHIRT AND KHAKI CARGO
shorts standing in the bar-lounge of the Four Seasons Hotel in Austin, Texas, on
Friday night of this year's South by Southwest music festival. Back in the go-go '90s,
this was schmooze central, where every wannabe player clocked SXSW time.
Now, with sales tanking, labels consolidating, and staffs liquidating, it's a com-
parative dead zone. Retired couples box-step by the fireplace while a handful of
industry grunts soldier on, draining the last $13 martini out of their soon-to-dry-up
expense accounts.
"I'd rather drag my penis through ten miles of gravel than be here," says Stephen
Bazzell, lead singer of the unsigned Atlanta modem-rock band Uncrowned. He
slumps dovm in a plush chair, scowling from beneath a baseball cap pulled tight
over a red do-rag. Bazzell and his bandmates are killing time while their manager,
Bret Bassi, is on a sofa across the way chatting with a (seemingly sloshed) publish-
ing exec from Universal Records and a certain songwriter-for-hire.
"It's some guy who helped develop a band I fucking hate," spits Bazzell. He
won't elaborate, but later I discover it's the mastermind behind the Oklahoma
band Hinder, the most commercially successful new rock act of the past year.
Hinder's shtick as a sleazier Nickelback is pretty crass, but they did record the
most undeniable power ballad of 2006, "Lips of an Angel" (also a country hit for
Jack Ingram), cowritten by the man on the sofa, Brian Howes. Uncrowned, who
are in the midst of recording songs they hope will lead to a major-label deal, have
already met with a couple of cowriters — most notably Lee Miles, who worked on
one of last year's surprise rock breakthroughs, the debut album by emo-ish Florida
pretty boys the Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, and who recently toiled on the latest for
neo-grunge lifers Puddle of Mudd.
But as the members of Uncrowned gain more faith in their own abilities, they
feel increasingly uneasy about the cowriting gambit, a driving force behind more
of today's rock hits ih;m anyone cares to admit. They're trying to forge their own
sound, but they also want to succeed, or least make a living as a band, especially
since Bazzell and headstrong guitarist Jack Andrad have been writing music together
since 2001 and touring the Southeast with different lineups since 2003.
"Dues have been paid for a while," says Axel Lowe, the drive-time DJ at Adanta
alternative-rock station 99X, who has known the band for years. "They're tenacious
and likable and talented, and I think they're getting really close. It'sjust a matter
of getting that one hit song."
But is it?
In many ways. Uncrowned exemplify the volatile, vulnerable state of today's
music business, a world rife with confusion, delusion, great promise, and great
risk. With CDs being eclipsed by downloading (which brings in far less revenue).
82 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cci
UNCROWNED
major record companies are more desperate than
ever to score megapopular acts. A band that sells,
say, 300,000 albums is negligibly profitable, at best.
The large-scale services a major offers — distribution,
marketing, promotion — are more suited to pushing
Justin Timberlake from two million to five million
copies sold. Few new rock bands approach that level,
and it'll be obvious when they do: They will be the guys
with the sculpted stubble and volumized hair, starring in a glossy video set in a
church filled with flickering candelabra, directed by some guy named Nigel Dick.
Prepare to grimace just so on the heartrending chorus (that you didn't write).
And what does a "hit" mean anymore? Radio rotates only a handful of songs
to an ever-declining audience, and MTV airs just a smattering of videos. Fans
'THEY'RE WAITING TO
BE SWEPT OFF THEIR
FEET BY A LABEL"
A RECORD EXEC
and Tapes 'N Tapes. Artists who have yet to release
a record are pursuing publishing and sponsorship
deals. One of the most talked-about indie bands of
the past few years — Clap Your Hands Say Yeah — is
perhaps more notable for its no-label business model
than its music.
But the problem with a DIY approach is that you
have to do it yourself. And that means a generation
of artists who spend coundess hours attempting to manage their own affairs and
husde every angle. But what if you're not Pete Wentz or Jay-Z or Arcade Fire? What
if you can't trade on a punk or hip-hop or indie tradition? What if your numerous
marketing ideas haven't quite panned out? What if you've got a killer MySpace
page and consistendy draw 300 people in dubs three states away and sell several
are more likely to encounter new artists via TV commercials or soundtracks,
video games, file-sharing, Internet radio, MySpace, YouTUbe, etc. People are
listening to much more music, and it's not uncommon for a random track to
get passed around or dovmloaded by millions in a weekend's time. But it's rare
for a single song to capture the mass imagination long enough for it to translate
into a real career for the artist. So why would a young, loud, aggressive rock
band like Uncrowned, or their management, bank on that one demographically
transcendent fluke?
"Their problem is, they're functioning in the old system of waiting to be swept off
their feet by a label or some giganto marketing push that's going to propel them to
stardom," says a record execudve who has met with the band and asked not to be
named. "The new paradigm calls for you to take care of your own niche first."
The new paradigm. Maximizing outside revenue streams. Monetizing digital
content. CDs as loss leaders. More and more you hear these buzz phrases thrown
around by the type of people who, back in the '90s, would've been arguing
abstractly about whether Kurt Cobain was a hypocrite or a savior. It's finally
a DIY world (bereft of political context, of course). Musicians across all genres
are necessarily, obsessively business-minded; it's not just gimme-the-loot rap-
pers anymore. Since the Internet can reach millions of consumers directly, even
standard indie labels may soon be passe — managers and booking agents wield
the influence. The money isn't in record sales (down 20 percent this year) , but in
diversifying your brand beyond hoodie/T-shirt merch — just recendy, press releases
have hyped Beck's Sketchel shoulder bag, an All-American Rejeas-designed Pepsi
can, a skate-shoe partnership between Etnies and Chester Bennington's tattoo
studio, and an Urban Outfitters indie-rock tour featuring the Ponys, Voxtrot,
MORE AT SPIN.COM For more photos of UrKrowned's Austin trwasion and to hear
what they actually sound tike, go to www.spin.com/uncrowned
thousand copies of your self-released record, but can barely pay the rent? What if
you were a passing industry fancy a couple years back, but now that you're a far
better band, interest has waned? What if you're so anxious to jump-start your career
that you let your manager come hat in hand to the freaking guy from Hinder?
What if you're Uncrowned?
'HEY. MAN. OUR DICKS ARE LIKE DIVINING RODS."
It's Thursday night at SXSW, and Uncrowned — singer Bazzell, 25; guitarist Andrad,
24; bassist Stuart Clark, 25; and drummer Scott Sellers, 26 — are surveying Austin's
Sbcth Street. The dowmtown area, closed off by police barricades, is a product
tie-in petri dish, where the five-day festival's 11,000 registrants, 1,400 bands, and
thousands more hangers-on try to cultivate a cultural buzz. But for Uncrowned,
whose Friday show isn't an official SXSW event, it's a plum chance to scam — in a
professional capacity, of course.
"If you're in a band and you walk up to a girl, it's an event, when normally it
might qualify as stalking," says Andrad, laughing. With his perma-shades, carefully
mussed thicket of hair, three ornate tattoos (all Dali paintings), chunky silver
jewelry, and confident, louche stride, he's the group's unquestioned leader. A
diplomat's son bom in New Jersey and raised in Italy, Fiance, England, Spain, and
Israel, he speaks five languages fluently. Tonight, his strategy is to take Polaroids
with potential fans and write the band's show info on the back. Then the Polaroid
can be used as a free ticket.
After the band promise their manager that they won't stop until the camera is
empty, we're off. For the next two hours, it's a blur of clingy sundresses, numbingly
tight low-rise jeans, blinding tans, pierced belly buttons, strappy heels, French
manicures, and sheepish hugs. The guys' charm is easy and imflagging. The campaign
peaks with a couple of athletic blondes in microminis and black stiletto boots.
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 83
UNCROWNED
"Equestrian instructors," confides Sellers, the husky, wisecracking drummer
with a rooster-ish rocker 'do. "They invited us to go horseback riding out by the
river and through the hills. They said they'd make it wonh our while."
Do you think they'll come to the show? I ask.
"I can only pray," he answers, folding his hands.
Then, the group is suddenly confronted by one of the festival's most famihar
sights — a street teamer hawking free Trojans. A late-20s bnmette wearing a teimis
shirt and slacks, she hands out samples and enthusiastically asks, "Are you a band?"
The guys nod, give a perfunctory run-through of the Polaroid routine, and are
quickly back on the move.
1 think she really wanted to come to the show, I say to Andrad. Didn't you think
she was cute?
"I don't do cute. 1 do hot," he announces, griiming.
Don't you wanna get any guys to come?
"I was always told that in order to be a rock star, you needed two things: The
girls wanna have sex with you, and the guys wanna be you. If we get the girls,
the guys will come."
Is that what you really think, or are you just bullshitting?
"That's your job to figure out," he replies, still grinning.
It's a fool's game to judge anyone by what goes on at SXSW. The hypercompeti-
tive, overstuffed atmosphere can turn a meek Takka Takka-streaming blogger into
a SoCo-swilling blowhard with an agenda. And away from the festival free-for-all.
Uncrowned revert to being earnest, humble, committed musicians who just want
their songs to be heard. The band's self-released debut CD, 2005's Simple Sick
Device, is a skillfully arranged maelstrom of melodic post-grunge with electronic
tinges and huge choruses. It's also an obvious triangulation of Smashing Pumpkins,
Pearl Jam, and Nine Inch Nails, which Andrad admits ("It's like our little redheaded
stepchild"). But a newer track, "Devil in My Hand" (recorded gratis by the owner
of a cush Atlanta studio), which melds grinding guitars and falsetto vocals, and
has a boyish cri de coeur refrain — "Say it with conviction / Say it like you lived
it" — is as affecting as anything currently on modem-rock radio.
What gives Uncrowned a genuine artistic and emotional core is the intense,
unlikely friendship between Andrad and Bazzell. The former grew up in relative
luxury overseas, worshipping his father the Air Force military attach^ (later. Jack
was even recniited by the State Department) ; the latter was bom while his father
the con artist was in prison, and spent his teen years in youth homes and with
foster families. At age eight, he was singing "My Prerogative" on street comers for
spare change, and at ten, he was helping his dad bilk a church mission and later
rob the minister's house. Bazzell and his parents spent many nights sleeping in
their Ford Fairlane. And at 11, he remembers watching federal agents chase his
dad into the woods behind a Wendy's.
"That was a big year for me," he says with a trace of sarcasm. "We got caught in
a hotel in Suwanee, Georgia. The feds knocked on the door, and me and my mom
hid under the bed. Beforehand, my father had said we should bring the car across
the street, and he'd meet us and we'd be out of there. I don't know how he got away,
but here he comes, and he runs right by us, says, 'I love you,' and went down a hill,
and that's the last I ever saw of him. Then these dudes vinth suits and .40-calibers
stuck one in my face." Bazzell wouldn't see his mom for three years.
He was immediately on his ovm, but that's when things turned around. "I was
finally taken in by this family — it's hard to find a home for an 11-, 12-year-old kid,
everybody wants a two-year-old — and that's when the musical world came into
focus for me. [Smashing Pumpkins'] Siamese Dream came out, and then Korn's
first album — all these angry, energetic albums — and I had all this stuff that was
pent up in me for so long. Those albums were really my epiphany."
Wanting to be more involved in music, Bazzell joined his school chorus,
worked at strengthening his voice, and eventually was offered a scholarship to
the University of Georgia — for opera. He lacked a few credits, so he attended a
junior college in Gainesville. But the dream of Puccini arias soon ended.
"My grandfather, who was the only person I ever felt was a real father figure to
me, was dying of cancer," he continues. "I just felt alone and started binge drinking
and let myself go. I would be in there trying to sing 'Ave Maria' drunk. I started a punk
band, my first band. I had dyed-orange hair and fd pass out onstage. It was like this
Nick Cave droning creepiness that would go into a drug-induced, Iggy Pop chaos
thing. I just embraced that disdain for life, and the music was so passionate. Iggy
Pop is a god, man. You find that and it's like. That's rock'n'roll! You wanna wrap your
skin aroimd it. But it just became too intense for me. 1 spiraled out over the edge."
Cr:
And that's when the partners met. "Irony of ironies, Jack was at our last show.
I walked up to him and told him that his band sucked, but he was good. And for
some reason, he saw something in me."
Andrad was adrift at the time, as well. He'd been studying music at Miami Dade
College Nonh, but dropped out when his father died in 1999, and then moved to
Atlanta. A cosmopolitan shredder who loved Judas Priest and Slipknot, he believed
he'd found his singer, but the orphan ex-punk wavered.
"It was awkward in the beginning," says Bazzell. "He'd ask me for my vocal
ideas, and I'd be out in left field; and I'd ask what his ideas were, and I couldn't
comprehend what he was saying — so we made awkward music. But then a fi-iend-
ship grew, a true musical brotherhood. Jack could've ditched me many times, but
he believed in what I could do. Basically, he saved my life."
Bassist Clark joined early on, but it took seven drummers and a few years before
Sellers auditioned in 2004. And it has taken another two and a half years for
the band to fully connea. "We're actually starting to make music from all of our
influences," says Bazzell. "I feel like Jack and I are just finding our artistic voice.
Before, we were getting to a place where we were gonna make art, but we weren't
doing it. Now it's starting to feel like we are."
His words, which usually have a wounded, wary edge,
sharpen. "I don't deserve anything for what I've been
through — life doesn't work that way. But I do believe
this band deserves to be heard. With my original ex-
periences put with this music and these guys and this
chemistry..." He pauses. "I just feel lucky to be alive. I
wanna live 500 years."
WE USED TO JUMP
AROUND LIKE
MONKEYS ON ACID."
DRUMMER SCOTT SELLERS
ITS PROBABLY NOT THE BEST IDEA TO DISCUSS
your future over Jell-0 shots and scrambled eggs. But that's SXSW. The Texas
sun scorches the Iron Cactus patio, and everyone is squinting as Uncrowned and
manager Bassi meet with Jason Spiewak, a founding partner of Rock Ridge Music,
an "independent" label affiliated vinth Warner Music Group.
After some industry chatter — digital and mobile marketing, etc. — Spiewak
leans forward, almost smirking. "So I'm curious about your little label-shopping
expedition," he says, referring to the band's fairly public pursuit of a record dejil.
"What exactly are you looking for?"
"We're looking for an A&R who can really be a pan of our family and grow with
us," Andrad says, but Spiewak cuts him off.
"You know there's a chance that guy will be gone by the time your record comes out.
Selling promise isn't good enough. It's about what you can bring to the table now."
Andrad's cool demeanor begins to dissolve. "Well, what we bring to the table
is that we're a hardworking band with kickass songs and great stories," he says,
a bit defensively. "We've done things that other unsigned band haven't — we've
got instrument endorsements from a half-dozen companies, we have a guitar
in the Hard Rock Cafe's memorabilia collection, we've
had songs on television shows. We've even done house
remixes and Spanish remixes of our songs."
"Is that based on a fan base, or are you just hoping?"
"The Latin rock market is huge," Andrad replies.
"Listen," says Spiewak, "labels want to know basic
facts: What sales history do you have? In what touring
markets do you have a strong following? Do you have a
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 85
UNCROWNED
substantial online presence? And we have to get back to the music. Music powers
the format, not the other way around."
"All I know," Andrad says firmly, "is that we've put our lives into this band, and
we're going to accompUsh great things, and we've already accomplished great
things, and if somebody wants to be involved with that, fine."
Finally, Bassi, who had gotten up to take a call while most of the ball-breaking
transpired, suggests that we ask for the check. Nobody objects.
It's meetings like this that remind you why virtually every band that has any
success, no matter how underground, has a cold-eyed manager. Even the sawiest
musician can buckle under the burden of writing songs, touring, and handling
business. For years, Andrad was de farto manager, and if not for his dauntless
ingenuity, Uncrovmed would've crumbled.
But after playing a number of label showcases and not signing a deal, the band
had a biner split with their drummer at the time, and things took a turn. First, they
entered and won the 2004 Shot at the Cabo Wabo battle of the bands, sponsored by
the Hard Rock Cafe and Sammy Hagar's Cabo Wabo Tequila. The grand prize was an
invitation to play Hagar's Mexican Meltdovm birthday bash in Cabo San Lucas.
"I thought the batde of the bands was a bad idea, but they didn't ask for my opin-
ion on that one," says David Prasse, an Atlanta attorney who works with Mastodon
and the Whigs, and has supported the band pro bono since before it was even named
Uncrowned (after a Charles Bukowski poem about an unsung boxer who defeats
champions in nontitle fights). "It's too much like sports. I know, in a sense, music
is competitive, but battle of the bands? It's art. It's not arm wrestling."
Still, the rock-star treatment was seductive: Hagar's driver chauffeured them from
the airport to the lavish, all-expenses-paid Hotel Hacienda Beach Resort, where the
staff greeted them with margaritas — "From Sammy! " As Andrad wrote in a blog
post, they were "like four kids at Christmas." After the show, they were lured into a
beer-chugging contest by the dark prince of mulnplatinum rock cheesery, Nickelback's
Chad Kroeger To make a gross story short, Kroeger and Andrad faced off and slammed
betvreen 11 and 13 Coronas each, before nature said no. A queasy Andrad was led over
to a trash can by Kroeger, who stuck two fingers down the guitarist's throat. Without
blinking, Kroeger walked overto a sink, washed off his arm, and baiked, "Bartender,
two more." Next night was a party for TV's Blind Date, where the guys so captivated
the producers that they were later flown out to Los Angeles to tape an episode.
Three of the four band members participated (Bazzell had a girlfriend at the time),
and at the end of the show, the band performed a set in a HolKwood club.
Cat-like RefleHesI
During this time, Bassi, who had heard Uncrowned's
song "You Deny" on the online radio station GarageBand.
com, e-mailed the group. A drummer for more than a
decade who also has an MBA, Bassi, 29, had just started
working with the Qiicago firm KMA Management, which
reps a number of young rock bands but is best known for
breaking nii-metal ragers Disturbed. Laconically cool but
persistent, he admired Uncrowned's skepticism. "They
drilled me with question after question," he says. "They wanted a layout of what
it would be like working together. They asked me about my time commitment,
since I was working with other bands."
Bassi's first goal was to have the band refocus musically, suggesting that Bazzell
take voice lessons and Sellers drum lessons. He wanted Andrad to concentrate
more on songwriting. "We used to jump around onstage like monkeys on acid,"
says Sellers, "but Bret said cut that shit out and strip it down."
In a way, their SXSW show was the culmination of a two-year rehab. And when
I speak with Jason Spiewak a week later, he relents: "I wish I'd seen them before
we talked, because the live show is kickass. They have the one thing that you can't
rehearse, and that's believability. I believe that they're up there and it's real."
But the faa remains that Uncrowmed want to be stars in a way that is increasingly
endangered . It practically takes a priestly blessing for a youngish rock band to cross
over to a mainstream audience — i.e., be recognized by people who don't follow
music — and remain artistically credible. Rather, the objective is to cut operating
costs, serve your core audience, and forgo the foie gras (it's too cruel, anyway).
Bassi demurs. "Our company approaches bands that we believe have the ability to
be, and want to be, vrildly popular on a nationwide scale," he says. "And that usually
leads us down the path of a major label, because they have the marketing money and
distribution channels. It's riskier than a DIY approach, where you sell your music
online and keep everything in-house, but the rewards are potentially greater. In
developing a band like Uncrowned, we try to do everything now that an indie label
'WE'VE EVEN DONE
HOUSE REMIXES OF
OUR SONGS."
GUITARIST JACK ANDRAD
would be doing, so we can show a major they're taking
the reins of a horse that's already moving."
He's backed up by an unlikely source. "I'd rather be
on no label or a major label," says Nick Stern, manager
of Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. "Indies usually can't sell a
ton of records — and you only get a percentage of those
sales, anyway. They can't pay you an advance and they
can't give you tour support, so how are you going to
make any money? How are you able to quit your day job, which is the goal for all
these kids? At least a major label can cut you a check up front."
But Uncrowned have grander dreams. They want to put on the eyeliner and
watch the lights come up on 30,000 people and eat Kobe filet and be respected
artists. And after talking to Bassi a couple of weeks after SXSW, I find out what
that kind of ambition ultimately means.
"This is a tough one," Bassi says slowly, "because David Prasse has been with the
band from the inception. But we're transitioning into working wfith Jeffrey Light, the
attorney for Christina Aguilera and Red Hot Chili Peppers. It's one of those things.
The band is all about building a family, and David was, or is, a part of that family.
But with the kind of contacts Jefft'ey Light has, he can go straight to the top."
It's rare when you're working on a story that you get a legitimate chill, but I did
when I got off the phone with Bassi. Prasse, who cut his teeth booking shows in
Athens during the early-'80s underground-rock renaissance, is one of the smartest,
most genuine, plugged-in people I've ever met in the industry. And there had been
several times I'd wondered why he still had anything to do with Uncrowned.
"One thing that's different about those guys from the indie school," Prasse
says carefully, "is that they're not precious about what they're doing. They wanna
reach a lot of people. With some musicians, what they're doing is from the heart,
and they don't care if anybody pays attention. Whether R.E.M. was like that or
not, they convinced us they were, and it endeared us to them." He hesitates for a
second. "With Uncrowned, I just don't know."®
The Fit is Go!
Pounces off the line! Super agile! Super new! Fit Sport with steering wheel-mounted paddle shifters"! Stealthy! flt.honda.com
■Fit Sport with 5AI only 1-8M-33 Honda ®2006AmencanHofidaMolo<Co .lnc.
LIVE AT BOWERY BALLROOM, NEW YORK CITY
Young Lov/e
February 28, 2007
You play.
Find out more about live performance payments at SESAC.com.
Your Music, Your Rights, Your Money
■
S E S A C
■
I
NASHViUE I lOS ANGELES | NEW YORK | ATLANTA | LONDON WWWJESK.COM
Reviews
YOUR GUIDE TO THE LATEST IN MUSIC AND MORE
Not Much. Just Chillin':
Post-rehab, Americana's dark diarist kicks back and shares by will hermes
Wilco
Sky Blue Sky
NONESUCH
The pastorale LP is a
rock'n'roll tradition. It's
what happens when a
band — motivated by
tinnitus, bankruptcy,
drug-crazed melt-
downs, or merely an aesthetic conver-
sion—strips things down to the gentle,
the pretty, the chillin'-by-the-fishin'-hole-
vi/ith-my-Martin-D50-acoustic-which-
incidently-is-worth-ten-times-what-
you-paid-for-your-car. Rock pastorales
usually follow darker, noisier records
and tend toward the soberly optimistic,
or at least the comfortably fatalistic,
offering up salt-of-the-earth verities
about life and death and love and loss.
The Grateful Dead had Workingmon's
Dead. Springsteen had Nebraska. Nirvana
had MTV Unplugged in New York. Now
Wilco— in their continuing quest to
rank with rock's Big Machers— have Sky
Blue Sky. Build a campfire and break out
the pot brownies.
Or not. "Maybe the sun will shine
today / The clouds will blow away," sings
Jeff Tweedy to begin his first studio
record since a prescription-drug rehab
stint in 2004. "I will try to understand /
Everything has its plan." There's a faint
12-step, one-day-at-a-time vibe to many
of the songs here, with lyrics about
being "strung out like a kite," about sur-
vival and redemption and being thankful
and maybe higher powers. Of course, in
these Britney-head-shaving days, this is
our cultural lingua franca as much as it
is addict-speak. Welcome to the group,
and thanks for sharing.
Wilco have always seemed like a band
looking for an identity— or avoiding
one. That was part of their charm, and
Tweedy's slightly spcxjky Midwestern
blankness lent itself to all sorts of set-
tings. But here's the album you might've
expected from this former alt<ountry
poster boy before he started getting all
experimental on 1999'5 Summerteeth.
Sky Blue Sky is basically an urbane roots
Wilco have always
seemed like a band
looking for an identity.
record, flooded with sunny, ragtimey mel-
odies, chooglin' Southern-rock grooves,
slightly off-kilter song structures, swirling
organ riffs, and sparkling guitar lines. The
sprouting jam-band vibe of 2004's A Chost
Is Born fully blooms here, minus all the
wanking. Experiment-minded producer/
player/mixologist Jim O'Rourke, a major
influence on Ghost and the band's pivotal
Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, is mostly sidelined.
Up front is alt-country/out-jazz guitar god
Nels Cline, playing so tastefully he sounds
as if he were on loan from Steely Dan,
when he's not channeling Jerry Garcia.
Between him. Tweedy, and third guitarist/
keyboardist Pat Sansone, they've made
the most beguiling guitar-rock record of
the 21st century.
Sky Blue Sky ain't all blue skies. Its bliss is
blistered; loneliness lurks behind love, war
shadows art. But like a new yoga convert,
it is determined, and its happiness feels
hard won. After a handful of listens, I
only virish the songs were more indelible,
though they're comfy as worn sweatshirts.
But time may prove their durability. As is,
this is a near-perfect album by a band that
seems, finally, to have found their itJentity.
At least for the moment.
ILLUSTRATION BY RYAN SANCHEZ
STAR RATINGS ★★★★★CLASSIC **** EXCELLENT *★* GOOD ★★FAIR ★POOR
iterial
Bjbrk: "Tell me,
are you that
somebody?"
Whatever She
SaySp Goes
Despite esteemed guests, the auteur rules
Bjork
VoUa ★★★V4
ONE UTTLC mDIAH/XTlANTlC
It takes a brave woman to
second-guess Timbaland. Or
a foolish one. Or Bjork. Word
that the Icelandic iconoclast
had retwiddled the results of
her in-studio tryst with Mr.
Mosety dashed any hopes
that she'd abandon herself
to horny megapop escapism.
And Volta'i amazing opener,
"Earth Intruders," dispels any
doubts about the strength
of her arty instincts. Over
Tim's stomping beat (weirdly
redolent of the introductory
jackboots of Never Mind
the Bollocks), Bjbrk layers
percussive clatter from the
Congolese ensemble Konono
No. 1 for a funky stomp
that's equal parts pre- and
postmodern.
She channels that avant-
trad feeling into the brassy
arrangements, suitable for
both a medieval Viking
fortress or contemporary
concert halL "Tribal" is
Bjork's word for this sound,
and the free-form drum
tattoos that Chris Corsano
and Lightning Bolt's Brian
Chippendale pound out fit
that description. But she also
contains each drummer 's
wilder experimental side,
and similarly shapes the
kora sound of Malian master
Toumani Diabate into lovely
but Bjdrk-friendly harp
She dashes any
hope of horny
megapop escapism.
imitations. She integrates
her guests on such solipsistic
terms that "collaboration" is
a misnomer— they're simply
extensions of her own self.
"My Juvenile," a duet with
Antony Hegarty (of Antony
and the Johnsons), even casts
the falsetto warbler in the role
of her inner child. Fortunately,
whether she's orchestrating
a B-movie death march
("Vertebrae by Vertebrae")
or a seaside fantasia
("Wanderlust"), her vision is
worth the price of submission.
KeiTH HARRIS
REVIEWS I NEW CDs
Au Revoir Simone
The Bird of Music
oun SKuer sccoRD coMPAny
Synth and sensuality power
Brooklyn group's debut
This all-female trio would like
to teach the world to sing in
perfect harmony— though the
world they inhabit is akin to that
of a Phillip K. Dick novel, where
the robots are more real than the
humans. Opening with a beatific,
otherworldly campfire sing-along
("The Lucky One"), they move
on to a percolating mash note to
Gary Numan ("I Couldn't Sleep")
and a deliciously icy tribute to
Brian Wilson ("Fallen Snow").
Powered by vintage keyboards,
a lockstep beat box, and
gorgeous, wide-eyed warbling,
the Simones create make-out
music for your inner android.
SHANNON ZIMMERMAN
Balkan Beat Box
Nu Med ★★★★
IDUB
A global peacekeeping mission
that you can dance to
Ever the uniters, this New York-
based Gypsy/Jewish troupe
have extended their reach on
these culture-melding sessions.
Highlights include a melody
remembered from a Moroccan
childhood, a first-time rap from a
Syrian singer trained in Egyptian
Styles, and a duet by London
Bulgarian Choir vocalists who
participated via e-mail. Under-
neath all those worldly voices,
traditional Middle Eastern instru-
ments pair off with electronic
beats, and the oompah-backed
grooves are sultry enough to
inspire a different kind of unit-
ing—if you know what I mean.
UNDSEY THOMAS
Battles
Mirrored
WARP
Songs guaranteed to start a
mosh pit at band camp
Remember "shock and awe"?
On their debut album, Battles
bring that brutal, futuristic preci-
sion to the art-rock avant-garde.
Featuring keyboardist/guitarist
Ian Williams of math rockers Don
Caballero and drummer John
Stanier of post-hardcore virtuo-
sos Helmet, this New York-based
group layers sound manipulator
Tyondai Braxton's alien vocals
over muscular, off-kilter grooves.
Think Captain Beefheart, if he'd
been a fan of kraut rock and
Animal Collective— or, on the
deep, martial drums of single
"Atlas," Marilyn Manson. For
rock that's both fist-pumping
and forward-looking, this album
suggests that Battles have few
peers, marchocan
Ben + Vesper
All This Could Kill You
SOUUDS fAMIlYSC
Beware the pitfalls of riding
on indie-rock coattails
The Sufjan Seal of Approval
ought to be indie hard currency,
but Stevens can only nudge
doors open— he can't bestow
the mellifluous subtlety of his
own work on his friends. And
with their flaccid, too-cool
folk pop, husband-and-wife
songwriters Ben and Vesper
Stamper squander any love
by association they might've
earned from their guest banjo-
ist/oboist. Ben's flat, remote
vocals suggest seriousness, but
he mostly sounds bored, even
when he ought to be pleased
(the syrupy ode to a newborn
"8 Mo.") or excited (the murky
ode to life "Live Free or Try").
When Vesper chimes in, things
brighten up considerably— think
Ida and early Low— but even
those spikes aren't really worth
the wait, ioshmodcu
Black Moth
Super Rainbow
Dandelion Oum
GSAVCFAa
Makes "Lucy in the Sky With
Diamonds" sound sober
Imagine Air's "Sexy Boy" played
in a dingy shack for 45 minutes
Straight by fashion-unconscious
'shroom enthusiasts with a
psych-rock fetish, and you've
got a peek into Dandelion Gum.
A loose, joyous groove defeats
any hint of psychedelia's dark
underbelly on this Pennsylvania
group's fourth album, which
rings with cheery flutes, analog
synths, vocoder-soaked vocals,
and very strange sentiments, as
band members named Power
Pill Fist and the Seven Fields of
Aphelion deliver inscrutable
songs with titles like "Jump
Into My Mouth and Breathe the
Stardust." JOSH MODCLL
Bone Thugs-N-
Harmony
strength & Loyalty -kirky,
full SURFACE/imCRSCOPE
Cleveland motormouths are
back from tha crossroads
Bone Thugs were always better
off concentrating on harmony
over thugging: Anybody can talk
shit, but these guys are still alone
when it comes to rapping a mile
a minute— me/orficoWy. And now,
with the assistance of producer
Swizz Beatz, the veteran group's
dizzying flows remain flawless
(though they do miss Bizzy
Bone, their ODB, who left in
2005). "Flowmotion" and "Bump
in the Trunk" are frenzied
masterpieces. And while 'Lil
L.O.V.E.," the chintzy collabora-
tion with Mariah Carey and Bow
Wow, is a clumsy reach, "Never
Forget Me" is an epic, even tri-
umphant closer that touchingly
addresses the Thugs' legacy.
THOMAS COUANOPOULOS
Balkan Beat Box: A musical forum for settling International disputes
90 JUNE 2007 WM/W.SPIN.COM
Cr
Boris, With Michio
Kurihara
Rainbow ★**>4
DSAC CITY
Sludge-punk visionaries evoke
a less noisy, nodded-out time
Further cementing their status
as collaborators on the level of
Ludacris and Vichy France, the
Japanese power trio Boris throw
down with psych-rock virtuoso
Michio Kurihara, whom beardo-
nerds know from bands such
as White Heaven and Ghost.
Everyone goes back to their
'70s roots on this surprisingly
chill outing. Michio's solos are
the sound of bong hits to Dark
Side of the Moon, and his guitar
style blends brilliantly with that
of Boris axwoman Wata, who
matches him feint for nimble
feint. Music for space gods
returning to earth. ;0E CROSS
Bralcesbralces-
bralces
The Beatific Visions ★★*%
HOUCH TSADC/WORLDS FAIR
Still-feisty Brits temper their
outbursts with— love?
Having tripled their name
to avoid confusion with the
Philadelphia-based Brakes, this
English band open their second
album with a baptism-as-ftght
scene ("Hold Me in the River").
The pub stompers are as rowdy
as ever, but they're balanced
here by laid-back ruminations
on romance. Who knew Eamon
Hamilton could calm his wildly
cracking voice long enough to
walk hand in hand through the
park? Still, for party starters
and danger seekers, the dancey
"Spring Chicken" and 60-
second freak-out "Porcupine
or Pineapple" display the
band's mad shriek at its most
unhinged. UNDSCY THOMAS
The Bravery
The Sun and the Moon *♦
ISLAND
Harmless trendiness devolves
into grating self-importance
Step back a bit and the Bravery
look like a lark: bouncy, bass-
driven, fashionista New Yorkers
channeling New Order and
inadvertently biting the Killers'
style— things could be worse.
But zoom in on this overpro-
duced second album, dripping
with newly emboldened lyrical
pretensions, and you'll find
cracks in the enjoyable cliches.
A couple of Killers-lite rump-
shakers remain, but they're sunk
in the mire by hackneyed ballads
about troubled teens (the god-
awful "Tragedy Bound") and
choruses that strain for the
rafters in the most painfully
obvious ways, joshmodeu
Circa Survive
On Letting Go **
eauu VISION
A long-distance runaround
to a very forgettable fire
On their second album, this
atmospheric post-hardcore quin-
tet— emo's simultaneous answer
to Yes and U2— mostly prove that
Sunny Day Real Estate combined
those two influences much bet-
ter a decade ago. Merging ellipti-
cal lyrics about personal-spiritual
renewal with circular rhythms
and effects-soaked guitar, but
without any of Sunny Day's
hooks or dynamics. Circa Survive
hang everything on the dramatic,
upper-register pipes of vocalist
Anthony Green (ex-Saosin). But
his bandmates get so lost trying
to fill up the space around him
that sometimes Green sounds as
if he's singing on another record
altogether, aaron buhcess
Golden Child
Neptunes protege still hungry for a hit
Kenna
Make Sure They See
My Face
STAR TRAK/INTIRSCOPC
You can understand why
Kenna wants people to see
his face: New Sacred Cow,
this Ethiopian-bom synth-
fiop savanf s inventive 2003
debut, won him buckets of
buzz txit didn't make him the
household name his record
label and producer (the
Neptunes' Chad Hugo) were
Iv>ping for. (Check out Malcolm
Cladwell's best-seller BUnk for
an illuminating account of the
album's tortured history.)
Looking for the pop
validation that eluded him
last time, Kenna hired Hugo's
partner, Pharrelt Williams,
to helm two tracks on tfiis
follow-up to New Sacred Cow.
Williams' Midas touch has
lost some of its sure-shot
Left-field sonic
alchemy is Kenna's
creative strength.
gleam of late, but on "Loose
Wires," while Kenna bemoans
"all the hits that I've been
missing, " the producer hooks
up a radio-ready beat that
sounds like a choice outtake
from Kelis' "Milkshake"
sessions. "Say Goodbye
to Love," Williams'
other contribution,
has a jittery live-band
1 ' feel, like Chic fronted
by Dave Gahan.
The rest of the
album, produced by
Hugo, proffers similarly
clever juxtapositions:
In "Sun Red Sky Blue,"
Kenna works a rock-guy
yowl over percolating
drum-machine funk,
while "Out of Control"
cribs both the Ramones'
lyrics and the Rapture's
disco-punk groove. That
left-field sonic alchemy is
Kenna's creative strength,
and he hasn't sacrificed
It here in the name of
mainstream accessibility. He's
realized that a little studio
bling is just one more trick in
his bag. mikacl wood
REVIEWS
The Clientele
God Save the Clientele
Rainy-day pop that could stand
to get out more often
These Londoners specialize in
melancholic, Beatles-esque
melodies threaded through
phrases like The world is dark"
("No Dreams Last Night"), "You
end up alone" ("Isn't Lite
Strange?"), and "It's gonna be
a lonely, lonely day" ("The
Queen of Seville"). That's not
necessarily a problem, as the
luscious pedal steel that gooses
the latter two tracks proves.
Still, ringleader Alasdair
MacLean can be a sad sack, and
his band succeeds best when it
shakes off the doldrums: "Here
Comes the Phantom "—a sweet-
and-sunny "Daydream Believer"
pop rocker— and the disco-
inflected "Bookshop Casanova"
are the album's best moments.
SHANNON ZIMMERMAN
Chris Cornell
Carry On**
SURCTONE/INURXOK
Grunge forefather suffers from
amnesia— or just bad taste?
Apparently, Chris Cornell spent
his grunge glory days wishing
that he were in Stone Temple
Pilots. On his second solo out-
ing, the former Soundgarden
Would you IHu
to touch my
talisman?.
and Audioslave frontman
dresses down the faux-Zeppelin
balladry of 1999's Euphoria
Morning with heaps of fuzz
and cock-rock posturing that
suspiciously recall a certain
much-maligned San Diego
quartet. The opener sounds like
a rip of radio smash "Sex Type
Thing" and is even called "No
Such Thing." Maybe this is what
living in France does to you.
Kne ANDCRSON
Dan Deacon
Splderman of
the Rings
CAfl'ARr,
Baltimore goofball packs
ingenious sonic punch
Dan Deacon may look like Bill
Nye the Science Guy, but he's
more like Dr. Demento. This
one-man A/V club party makes
low-budget electronic pop that's
as bizarre as it is uproarious.
Deacon's first proper album
(after several limited releases)
tricks out Devo-esque new wave
with eight-bit beats, cartoon
sound effects, and munchkin-
pitched Ludacris quotes. While
a classically trained background
shows through the blissed-out
drones of "The Crystal Cat,"
Deacon's weird-science
experiments more often test
your funny bone— and shake
your moneymaker. MARC HOCAN
Digitalism
Idealism ★★★'/i
asthalwerks
Late-'90s rocktronica nostalgia
is here— woo-hoo!
Jens Moelle and Ismail Tuefekci
may be German, but the tracks
they make as Digitalism slot
right in with the recent wave
of Parisian house music for
headbangers. Idealism shows
off plenty of blaring synth riffs:
"Anything New" sounds like Fat-
boy Slim in robot drag, the title
track crosshatches Underworld
snarl writh Daft Punk cheese,
and "Digitalism in Cairo" vivi-
sects the Cure to simultaneously
disorienting and fist-pumping
effect. "I am the biggest party
ever," boasts the sole line of
"Home Zone," and that might
not be such an outrageous
claim. MICHACLANCELO MAT05
Dungen
Tio Bitar
KEMADO
If you want to soar angelic, just
take a pinch of psychedelic
Led by wunderkind multi-instru-
mentalist Gustav Ejstes, Dungen
No Fairy Tale
Alt rock's fiery earth mother bares her teeth
Tori Amos
American Doll Posse
Not merely the most confrontational,
catchy, and guitar-heavy music
of Tori Amos' career, this abrupt
about-face from 2005's sedate The
Beekeeper is arguably the singer/
pianist's greatest, and undeniably
sexiest, album. Now reserving
her motheriy side for family time,
Amos shifts into warrior mode, with
anthems so ballsy that her rep as the
remote princess of airy-fairy twinkle
begs for serious revision.
Start with the swaggering
"Teenage Hustling," where Amos
warns a sneaky young contender
not to go "skankin' around" her
man. Then check out the feral "You
Can Bring Your Dog," in which she
entreats a "pretty boy" to "play the
wolf for the evening." Her songs had
t>ecome long and loose over the
years; here they're tight and sharp
and snarling.
No longer just singing to the
converted, this consummate cult icon
now sounds committed to taking on
the world. From the softly seething
opener, "Yo George," to the climactic
lament "Dark Side of the Sun," this
23-track, but atypically succinct,
statement deals with life during "the
The consummate cult icon
is now taking on the world.
madness of King George" and calls
on women to stop disappearing
behind fragmented feminine roles
and reach out to their religion-
polarized brothers. Trading obscure
metaphors for assertive personae,
Amos sings with a remarkably
forceful focus. Anger has made her
accessible and her songs instantly
memorable. aARRY WALTERS
keep a fierce distance from
the fleeting indie-pop trends
of their fellow Scandinavians.
Here, with Swedish lyrics,
lysergic swatches, and breezy
flute passages, they display the
same studied appreciation for
Hendrix jams and Nordic folk
that marked their 2004 U.S.
breakthrough, Ta Det Lugnt.
But on this new batch of mood
enhancers, Ejstes orchestrates a
more intricate balance-
ebullient piano melodies tether
spiraling feedback on "Gor Det
Nu," while "En G5ng I Ar Kom
Det En TSr" filters triumphant
guitar riffs through pastoral
dirges. Tio Bitar may start with
wailing sirens, but Dungen
reject bells and whistles,
creating a subtle hallucinatory
pastiche, jcnnifcr MAfRZ
Electrelane
No Shouts No Calls irk-kV,
TOO PURC
Post-rock— it's not just for
wannabe jazz dorks
The English ladies of Electrelane
do angelic and droney equally
well, but it's when they com-
bine the two into a simmering
twee-pop/kraut-rock stew that
slight pleasures become tiny
triumphs. The mix is better
than ever on their fourth
album: "The Greater Times"
coaxes sunlight from murk,
imagining Stereolab without
the detached cool; and "After
the Call" teases with sweet
nothings before smashing
with indie-fried guitars. Even
when Electrelane ditch the
cheer completely (as on the
towering, Farfisa-led instru-
metal "Five"), they inspire
more smiles than growls.
JOSH Mooea
92 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COf^
Fields
Everything Last
Winter ★★★y,
BLACK LAB
They'll cut out your heart
with a delicate touch
Not to be confused with Field
Music, the Field Mice, the Field,
or Korn bassist Fieldy, Fields
are a British/Icelandic combo
that take typically bright pop
particles (male/female harmo-
nies, quavering synth lines) and
rearrange them into devastating
laments. A brusque kiss-off
("You're 18 / And you're dumb")
is buried under deceptively lovely
guitar lines on the acidic relation-
ship song "You Brought This on
Yourself": meanwhile, the mini
epic "Song for the Fields" opens
with an acoustic shuffle and
ends with a Doctor IV/io-creepy
keyboard incline. Winter \s an
easy album to enjoy, but a dif-
ficult one to trust. BRIAN RAFTERY
I Reissues
Sage Francis
Human the Death
Dance ★★Vi
ANTh/ePIJAPH
Hyper MC who's much too
inspired by "Me, Myself and I"
This is hip-hop for the people,"
says Sage Francis early on his
fourth album. "Stop calling it
emo." Stop bellyaching and
maybe we will. Francis' relent-
less self-examination can strike
real sparks— he's a clear-eyed
lyricist and his unorthodox flow
is plenty energetic— but he
falls into mawkishness far too
often ("All they ask is why I wear
these glasses / And all I can
tell them is, hell, it's good fash-
ion"). Still, this is more mature
than 20O5's A Healthy Distrust,
boasting straightforwardly
soulful production and smarter
punch lines ("If you ain't dead /
You ain't a suicide girl").
MICHAEIANCHO MATOS
Funeral for a Friend
Tales Don't Tell
Themselves **
AILANTIC
In screamo, the trouble starts
when the yelling stops
Though they're superstars at
home, this Welsh screamo quin-
tet have yet to conquer the U.S.,
despite arriving here in 2003
with a thunderously melodic
sound and a barge full of press
clippings. For their third album,
FFAF blatantly move beyond the
aggressive scene that spawned
them and focus on slicker ballads
that hint at '80s heartland-rock
The best finds of the month by will hermes
The Afghan Whigs
Unbreakable
(A Retrospective) ****
f If * tha/rhino
Anticipating the 2009 grunge
revival (when nuevo-metal
acts like Mastodon discover
hooks), this best-of by the
flannel era's horniest dudes
reminds us that they never
wore flannel and were never
really grunge: more like a
dapper, unhinged U2 tripping
on classic soul drama. And the
titles— "Retarded," "Debonair,"
"Crazy," "Faded"— go a
long way toward describing
frontrake Greg Dulli.
Tim Maia
World Psychedelic Classics 4:
Nobody Can Live Forever:
The Existential Soul of Tim
Maia ***%
LUAKA eOP
Legend has it that this late
Brazilian soul man and
inspired loony once tried to
dose the entire staff of his
record company (Philips) with
LSD; he later converted to
a religion that worshipped
UFOs. His music veers between
sweet, ornamented Curtis
Mayfield soul and samba-
flavored proto disco that even
aliens would probably dig.
Various Artists
FabricLive.33:
Spank Rock ****
MBS/C
The YoYoYoYoYo crew
understands that porn rap
can be totally charming if it's
done with a sense of humor
and fat bass lines. This mix
has both— and it's a mix, with
shards of "The Dominatrix
Sleeps Tonight" and other
electro/techno candy popping
up just when you thought
the Dls had refiled them. But
whose idea was Yes' "Owner
of a Lonely Heart"?
King Crimson
The Collectable King Crimson
Vol. 1: Live in Mainz, 1974, Live
in Asbury Park, 1974
DGM/INUtn KNOT
From the Larks' Tor\gues
if} Aspic/Startess and Bibte
Block/Red period, the de facto
golden era for these virtuosic
geeks. Like most prog rock,
it's best when the singer shuts
up. And the real action comes
when killer drummer Bill
Bruford starts chipping away
at Robert Fripp's glacial guitar
and mellotron riffs like he's
playing Atari Breakout.
Various Artists
Soul Sides Volume Two:
The Covers ***%
ZCALOUS
Spin is down with Oliver
Wang, a.k.a. 01 0-Dub, writer
and MP3 blog proprietor
(soul-sides.com), so this
shout-out is journalistically
suspect. Whatever. His second
set of obscure old soul also
cooks with vintage lamaican
reggae funk and even some
21st-century history: Antibalas'
Afro-beat remake of the Willie
Colon/Hector Lavoe salsa hit
"Che Che Cole," itself conjured
from a Ghanaian folk song.
African roots run deep.
Various Artists
Ellen Allien: Time Out Presents
the Other Side— Berlin ♦*♦
DEAF DUMa ♦ BLIHD
An odd audio/video tour of
Berlin hosted by the city's
most seductive techno Dl- The
CD mix has beat hypnotism
by Monolake and Ricardo
Villalobos (plus the essential
German version of Bowie's
"Heroes"), while the DVD
imparts crucial tourist info,
such as where Allien prefers to
browse for sex toys.
REVIEWS
melodrama. At its best ("Great
Wide Open"), Tales recalls Foo
Fighters' wimpier singles, but for
the most part, it's just a reminder
of why even Dave Grohl turns
up the screaming now/ and then.
AARON BURCCSS
Gang Gang Dance
Retina Riddim -kirkyi
THl SOCIAL BCCISTRY
Weird films, weirder sounds
from New York art-rocl( crew
This multimedia assault, though
high on concept, is the most
successful representation yet of
Gang Gang Dance's kaleido-
scopic, neo-primitive, post-punk
clamor. Keyboardist and visual
artist Brian DeGraw assembled
the 24-minute CD and half-hour
DVD from shows, soundchecks,
practice tapes, field recordings,
live video, tour footage, and
newly shot abstract vignettes. As
the title suggests, there's more
than a bit of synesthesia in play:
the pulsing, alien sounds on
the CD (throbbing, as in gristle)
suggest the style of the visuals,
while the film's lulling edits
merge with the music, i. niimi
The Horrors
strange House irkVi
STOLCN TRANSMISSIOH
Spooky U.K. sensations need
to sharpen their shtick
If the Horrors had crafted an
album's worth of creepy goth-
garage tracks that matched
the vampish ferocity of single
"Cloves" and riotous crowd-
pleaser "Sheena Is a Parasite,"
these young Brits really
could've blown the cobwebs
off the Cramps' handbook. But
Paris Rotter's vocals lack the
charisma to give the group a
true campy flamboyance, and
the insistent, haunted-
basement organ riffs scarcely
vary. Lyrics about bloodthirsty
lovers and serial killers are
ghoulish diversions, and Yeah
Yeah Yeahs' guitarist Nick
Zinner drops by, but the
Horrors are too shackled by
kitsch to scare life into such
creaky punk posturing.
jemlFER MAER2
Ugly Beauty
Withering stories of an empire in magnificent decline
The National
Boxer ★★**
SfCCaSS BAHQUIT
Since 1999, this Brooklyn-
via-Cincinnati quintet has
been trying to fuse poetic
lyrics, cinematic pull, and
nervy, restless rock in a
singular way. And on their
fourth album, they finally ful-
fill those ambitions, adding
brass, piano, and backup
singers to unveil high drama
of the blunt, uncliched sort
unheard since the Afghan
Whigs' '90s heyday.
Yet the National don't
just reconvene Greg Dulli's
sweaty seminars on sex and
soul. Boxer opens with Matt
Berninger's sweeping baritone,
recounting life in a privacy-
invading "Fake Empire," where
the oblivious and decadent
"tiptoe through our shiny city
with our diamond slippers
The National report
on an anguished
world of denial.
on." The lyrics' immediacy
recalls 2(X)4's "Wasp Nest," a
stunning class commentary
chronicling an obsession with
a U.S. aristocrat in a decades-
old cocktail dress. But here
the rhythms accelerate as the
album unfolds, and the horns
grow taut, puncturing, even
slightly jazz<razed. "Brainy,"
about stalking someone with a
"fancy, fancy mind," and "Slow
Show," about missing someone
you've never met, become
darting, rhythmic workouts.
And "Guest Room," with its
troubled couple retiring into
suffocation, chamber-pops
onto even grander, more
mysterious terrain. "Sometimes
you go ta'di-da-di-da-di-da-da /
Till your eyes roll back into
your head," Berninger explains
in the operatic "Racing Like a
Pro." And that's the anguished
world of denial that the
National report on. Horrible or
magnificent, it's all theirs.
JAMCS HUNTER
The Ike ReiUy
Assassination
We Belong to the Staggering
Evening **V4
SOCK RIDC£
Barroom bard's songs still
aren't equal to his words
This Chicago quintet's tipsy.
Southern-tinged rock serves
solely as a backdrop for
singer/songwriter Reilly's easy
rasp and quirky lyrics, which are
packed with droll one-liners and
the kind of deceptively specific
inanity that T.S. Eliot might've
enjoyed. But their bar-band
charm wilts midway and the
meek instrumentation drags
like a hangover, at one point
even nicking the melody of Billy
Idol's "White Wedding" ("I Hear
the Train"). Still, in "Fish Plant
Uprising," Reilly dares to ask
what CNN won't: "Who says you
can't toss a fish at a president?"
STACEY K. ANDCRSON
KRS-One
Hip-Hop Lives ★★★
KOCH
Searching for new magic with
his legendary '80s rival
Twenty years after the South
Bronx/Queensbridge throw-
down, KRS-One and Marley
Marl have squashed their beef;
but the results are cause for
only quiet celebration. The
fortysomething MC still has his
fastball— both the title track and
"Nothin" New" showcase pro-
vocative lyrics, original flows,
and uninhibited enthusiasm.
The production is another story:
Marley Marl provides mostly
gloomy backdrops hampered
by lackadaisical crate-digging
(or flat-out biting). For example,
"All School" knocks, but it's
only been three years since
Ghostface's "Run," which used
the same frantic beat to much
more dramatic effect.
THOMAS COUANOPOUIOS
Maroon 5
It Won't Be Soon Before
Long *★★'/!
OCTON[/AS,M
Grammy winners flash their
eclectic chops, dirty minds
When your first album sells four
million copies, you're bound
to try to play out a few musical
fantasies with the follow-up,
and these modern-pop lotharios
are now dabbling in everything
from nouveau disco to sleazy
funk to big-band balladry Such
diversity suits them well, how-
ever, and the only misstep is
frontman Adam Levine's
raunchy lyrics, which often
examine the joy of knocking
boots in such skin-crawling
detail that even Prince might tell
him to cool it. TREVOR KEUEY
Megadeth
United Atraminations irkyi
ROADSUmCR
Mustaine and Co. threaten to
thrash the government
Megadeth have never adapted
their razor-edged shredding to
straight-up arena rock as well
as Metallica, and even their
most ferocious '80s efforts felt a
little unresolved. The band has
always had a general political
awareness, but United Abomina-
tions is Dave Mustaine's serious
stab at protest rock, and the
results are similarly mixed.
Bad pun aside, the title track
is a delightfully jagged slice of
aggro, while "Gears of War" has
a hint of anthemic melodicism.
Still, too many of these overly
blustery blasts sound like
entrance themes for professional
wrestlers. KYLE Anderson
Mystery Jets
Zootime ★*★'/!
DIM MAK
Father and son's giddy racket
wakes up the neighbors
Zoos haven't been cool since Paul
Simon called giraffes "insincere"
in the late '60s, yet Mystery Jets
make a helluva case for them
on this British family band's
debut album. In fact, somewhere
between the first and 85th
time they scream "Zootimel" in
the title track, they whip up a
raucous mess of thudding bass
drum, Exocet guitar screech, and
glorious exuberance. When that
energy peaks, with the intricate
tempos of 'The Boy Who Ran
Away" and the Pink Floyd-
skimming "Horse Drawn Cart,"
the group's scuzzy rock is irresist-
ible. And though their bids for
introspective gravitas are too
ironic, there's enough promise
here to rattle more cages soon.
STACEY K. ANDERSON
Joell Ortiz
The Brick iBodega
Chronicles) ie-k-k
KOCH
The best Latino rapper since
Big Pun— and he crushes a lot
Joell Ortiz, the latest artist
signed to Dr. Dre's Aftermath
imprint, is well aware of his
niche. On "Hip Hop," he raps,
"I don't try to make you dance /
94 JUNE2007VmW.SPIN.COM
Cr:
Sa-Ra Creative
Partners: Secretly
plotting against
will. i. am
I rip beats." And on this warm-
up to his major-label debut, the
spirited rapper breezes through
four 12S-bar epics— the average
song contains 48. The coarse
production (gritty keys, straight
loops, little instrumentation)
actually complements his husky
vocals, but are three songs
about his hometown ("BQE,"
"Brooklyn Bullshit," "Brooklyn
(Remix]") really necessary?
THOMAS C0LIAN0P0UL05
Page France
Page France and the Family
Telephone irkyi
SUICIDC SQUf £/f
Surprisingly mature insights
marred by childlike tics
Page France's handcrafted folk
pop pushes awfully hard to
be quaint. Between the coy
vocals of leader Michael Nau
and some overly delicate play-
ing—note the repeated use of
bells— this Maryland quartet's
third album has a tendency
to bog down in preciousness.
That's a shame, because Nau's
songs are more complex than
they initially sound, smartly
tackling all sorts of prickly
grown-up situations. Anybody
who sings "I lie so well / I
start to buy it, too" is clearly
no stranger to deeper, darker
impulses, ion young
Sa-Ra Creative
Partners
The Hollywood
Recordings **Vi
Forward-thinking urban music
vets take a trip backward
This bicoastal progressive soul
trio have been music industry
players for more than a decade,
so maybe it makes sense that
their debut full-length is a
nostalgia trip to the days when
Prince was king, new jack was
still swinging, and trip-hop was
the future. That's not neces-
sarily a bad thing: Talib Kweli's
live rhymes jolt "Feel the Bass"
and the Rick James-via-Teddy
Riley electro-funk grind "Bitch"
works up real sweat. But
between the whispery vocals,
nodding beats, and grooves
that go on forever without
really getting anywhere, this
too often settles for '90s
oxygen-bar ambience— cool,
slight, and instantly forget-
table. DAVID PCISNCR
Satellite Party
Ultra Payloaded
COLUMBIA
Rock stars throw a rave in
space; the Lizard King abides
Satellite Party is built around
the unlikely pairing of ex-Jane's
Addiction frontman Perry Farrell
with former Extreme guitar-
ist Nunc Bettencourt. Yet that
meeting of the minds is actu-
ally the least nutty thing about
this debut, a trippy funk-rock
throwdown with guest spots
from Fergie, New Order's Peter
Hook, and the late Jim Morrison
(via a rediscovered recording),
plus an overarching concept
having something to do with
an imaginary environmentalist
group called the Solutionists.
As one song happily advertises,
flower-child "insanity rains."
Still, Bettencourt's howling
power-glam riffs pair well
enough with Farrell's alley-cat
wail. MIKACL WOOD
The Sea and Cake
Everybody *★*
THRILL IOCK[Y
Chicago lounge dwellers
reveal their sneaky edge
A quick taste of the Sea and
Cake's sighing voices and
moonlit guitars could raise
suspicions of a simple chill-out
session. But after a decade-plus
in action, Sam Prekop's crew
have mastered a more intricate
approach, seasoning their
gently introspective tales of
"distracted and lazy" lovers with
stronger ingredients. Here, John
McEntire's unusually loud drums
issue a bracing rebuttal to the
passive melodies, while the
psychedelic buzz of "Left On"
unleashes the simmering weird-
ness that's muted elsewhere.
ION YOUNC
Shapes and Sizes
Split Lips, Winning Hips,
a Shiner ***
ASTHMATIC KITTY
Indie rock that almost falls
apart— spectacularly
Shapes and Sizes don't play
songs as much as teeter toward
them, frequently finding grand,
cabaret-style moments in their
slipshod quest for inspiration.
When weird sounds find well-
placed melodies, it's impossible
to turn away— "Alone/Alive"
adds threadbare indie guitars
to theatrical female vocals,
left-field swooshes, and terrific
tempo changes, while "The
Horse's Mouthy Mouth" feels
like Broadway gone wonder-
fully to seed. Imagine the Fiery
Furnaces, if they had more
respect for structure and no
energy to waste on concepts.
lOSH Mooeu
MORE AT SPIN.COM Revisit our musk reviews wHh added
streams and select downloads, www.spin.com/reviews
REVIEWS
Rufus Wainwright: "Voutez-vous coucher avec moi, bitches!"
Swizz Beatz
One Man Band Man *1r*yi
UNIVERSAL MOTOWN
And you thought DMX was
the unstable one
"My album's crazy," boasts
Kasseem Dean, a.k.a. Swizz
Beatz, throughout his second
solo record. While other rap/
R&B producers turned perform-
ers have been disappoint-
ingly uneven lately— Timbaland,
WTF?— One Man Band Man
makes schizophrenia a virtue.
Gaudy beats start and stutter on
party joints like the delirious sin-
gle "It's Me Bitches." Swizz turns
socially conscious on the piano
pep talk "Part of the Plan," as-
sisted by Coidplay's Chris Martin.
But by the chest-thumping "Bust
Ya Gunz," the Beyonc^ hit-maker
is back to his Ruff Ryders roots.
Crazy? Possibly. MARC HOCAN
Richard Thompson
Sweet Warrior ★★★★
iHOUn FACJOHY
Tireless cult hero endures the
world with a biting wit
Richard Thompson plays
many parts: British folk legend,
electric guitar god, and bitterly
funny observer of life's endless
disasters. Sweet Warrior blends
all these roles, turning crushing
misery into ripping good enter-
tainment. The jaunty, laugh-out-
loud "Bad Monkey" scolds an
unreliable lover, and at the other
extreme, "Poppy Red" show-
cases Thompson's heartbreaking
croon. Of course, the main attrac-
tion remains his bristling, zigzag
guitar licks, which still astound
nearly 40 years on. ion young
Various Artists
Spider-Man 3: Music From
and Inspired By -k-k-k
RECORD COLLECTION
Peter and Mary Jane finally
put down their lighters
From the power-ballad franchise
that brought us mega-weepers
"Hero" by Chad Kroeger and
Josey Scott and "Vindicated"
by Dashboard Confessional,
this soundtrack shifts demos
for a sharp mix of unreleased
alt-rock tracks. "Move Away"
is the Killers at their new-wave
soap opera best. Yeah Yeah Yeahs
swagger like sexy champs, the
Walkmen are grandly discontent,
Wolfmother unleash a roiling
riff bomb, and Black Mountain
meander out for a lovely acous-
tic swoon. JOHNNY SRISKCR
Von Siidenfed
Tromatic
Reflexxions
DOMINO
Clinically shown to relieve
chronic side-project boredom
This loose, inspired collaboration
between German electronic duo
Jan St. Werner and Andi Toma
of Mouse on Mars and
terminally cranky Mancunian
Mark E. Smith should have been
the new Fall album. (It would've
been of a piece with the garage-
tronica of 1997's Levitate.) The
group has a rowdy blast on
tracks like "Serious Brainskin," a
glitchy sonic meltdown that
brilliantly complements Smith's
debased vocalese. y. NilMl
Rufus Wainwright
Release the Stars
CEfFEN
If the gay messiah shows,
here's his processional
The last time Rufus Wainwright
walked into a recording studio,
it was with a 50-piece orchestra
and enough hooks for a pretty
great EP. Unfortunately, he left
with a double album's worth of
nnaterial (released in two parts
as the critically tolerated Wont
series, from 2003 and 2004).
Here, the multitude of musi-
cians is back, but the songs are
actually strong enough to hold
the weight of the over-the-top
arrangements. Self-producing
for the first time, Wainwright
leans toward ornate, Nilsson
Schmilison-y chamber pop. The
excellent title track is the best
(possibly) Tom Cruise-inspired
torch ballad you'll hear in 2007.
LANe BROWN
Wheat
Everyday I Said a Prayer for
Kathy and Made a One Inch
Square ***Vi
IMPYStAN
Enigmatic and epic— and
they're not from Montreal!
After their minor 2003 hit "I Met
a Girl" and a prolonged hiatus,
this hooky Massachusetts band
returns with its fourth and
most rousing collection of
heart-on-sleeve anthems. Boast-
ing church organs, yearning
vocals, and strings, they're no
less self-possessed than Arcade
Fire, and you probably won't
hear three such beautifully
sweeping songs start another
album this year: the majestic,
devotional rock of "Closeness,"
the hopeful (almost folk-funk!)
bounce of "Little White Dove,"
and the existential, Pavement-
gone-power-pop groove of
"Move=Move." JASON CROSS
But Seriously
Rap-rock superstars make their bid for significance
Linkin Park
Minutes to Midnight
★*★%
WARHER BROS JMACHm SHOP
"I'm sick of being treated like
I have before," Mjke Shinoda
annourKes in "Hands Held
High," one of the few tracks on
the new Linkin Park album that
features the rapper/producer's
rhymes. Laden with somber
references to "bombs on
the buses" and Mao's "Little
Red Book," "Hands" is the
multiplatinum outfit's big
antiwar anthem. But Shinoda's
tine also seems to reflect the
way he and his bandmates
feel about their place in the
music scene: Though they're
heroes to a nation of Hot
Topic tweens, Linkin Park
are desperate for the sort of
respect showered on brainy
indie faves like Arcade Fire.
They're desperate for
the respect showered
on brainy indie faves.
So on Minutes to Midnight,
they give ttwir sound a
dramatic makeover with help
from producer Rkk Rubin,
that bearded Pez dispenser
of serious-artist cred. Per
his rep, Rutxin convinced the
band to go organic: "Given
Up" and "Bleed It Out" have
ragged guitars, handclaps, and
random background noise— a
delit>erate move away from
crafty, studio-sweetened hits
like "Numb" and "One Step
Closer." And in the more
densely layered cuts— such
as "The Little Things Give You
Away," on which singer Chester
Benm'ngton describes a scene
of post-Katrina desolation—
the music privileges texture
over catchiness. The arena-
emo hooks are still there, of
course, as lead single "What
I've Done" proves. But ttiis time
tfwy feel more like a means to
an end. MiMtL wood
THE FOURTH TIME'S THE CHARM.
Experience beer Cold-Filtered'
four limes for fresher, smoother flavor.
CF4X
EXPERIENCE IS GOLDEN
terial
REVIEWS I GAMES
Lara Croft Tomb Raider:
Anniversary
Ten years on, Lara Croft is still swinging
From the swirling snowflakes
to the sinuous way that buxom
British heroine Lara Croft shim-
mies along ledges, this captivat-
ing update proves beauty isn't
just skin deep. Introducing new
story elements, challenges, and
backdrops to the now-classic
1996 debut of gaming's favorite
leading lady, Anniversary not
only allows you to swing grace-
fully over a gaping chasm on
a grappling hook, it lets you
dodge arrow-spitting booby
traps and twirl through the air
while unloading twin pistols into
dinosaurs. Anniversary makes an
excellent case for one of enter-
tainment's great truisms: Sick
stunts plus massive 3-D environ-
ments, brain-boggling puzzles,
lead-spitting showdowns, and
heaving bosoms equals gaming
heaven. scoTTsremcnc
Forza Motorsport 2
MICROSOfT/XBOX 360
Buy expensive car. Crash expensive car. Repeat.
Comedian Eddie Griffin made
the news recently when he
crashed an Enzo Ferrari that
was valued at $1.5 million. It
would've been cheaper and
safer to just fire up this sequel.
The Enzo is here, along with the
Porsche 911 Turbo and more
than 300 other current and
classic hardbodies. Tweaking
tire pressure, engines, and drive-
trains is just as important as
mastering braking— sometimes
you feel more like a mechanic
than a wheelman. Granted,
the focus on authenticity
might leave your head— and
vehicle— spinning at first, and
your poor chassis will take a lot
of realistic wear and tear But a
killer suite of online multiplayer
options and genuine tracks
provide instant relief Leave your
signal-before-merging highway
etiquette at the door: Forza is
for hard<ore gearheads only 5.S.
Also Out
This Month
Diner Dash: Sizzle
and Serve
eiDOS/NmeNDO ds,psp
Next time you consider stiffing
your waitress, remember the
lessons of this food-service
homage: One, customers can be
pains in the ass. Two, if you're
a fledgling restaurateur named
Flo, teaming to sting food and
bus tables white juggting irate
patrons is a must. Three, it's no
fun when someone spits in your
cheesesteak. 5.5.
Brooktown High
KONAMI/PSP
For some, memories of high
school consist of four years
of wedgies, beatings, and
constant put-downs. Here,
it's an excuse to canoodle
with jailbait of both genders.
Customize a nerd, jock, goth,
or prep, then tackte tongue-
wrestting games and attempt to
romance that icy cheerleader.
It's just like The Sims, only with
more blackheads. S.S.
The New York Times
Crosswords
MAiESCO/NtNTENDO DS
The DS touch screen can now
be used for brainier pursuits
than customizing Pokemons.
Crosswords packs more than
a thousand puzzles, varying
in difficulty according to the
Times' scale (so "Sunday" is
the toughest). It also features
competitive games that allow
for head-to-head challenges—
or for exploiting your friends'
knowledge of opera. K.A.
DiRT ★★★★
CODEMASTCSS/XBOX 360. K. PS3
Tear up the asphalt— and sand and mud— rally style
Like soccer and Scissor Sisters,
rally racing captivates European
crowds but leaves Stateside audi-
ences cold. It's a strange devel-
opment, especially considering
that the sport— with its fast cars,
eye-popping stunts, and huge
wrecks— is an adrenaline junkie's
dream. Oi7?7" might be just the
catalyst to bring in new fans: It's
a taut racer that splits the differ-
ence between simulation and
goofy arcade speed-demonry.
Get behind the wheel of a rally
racer and kick up some dust
across photo-accurate tracks.
The game's realism comes from
a brand-new physics engine that
makes each surface and vehicle
combination feel unique, so the
trips across the desert in a dune
buggy require a totally different
set of skills than the raceway
courses. It's harder than a hair-
pin turn, but the rewards are
high-octane. KYLE Anderson
9mm
The Adventures of Darwin
Help prove evolution by acting like an ape
Japanese imports typically fall
into one of two categories:
Quirky yet entertaining [OI(arr\i)
and utter crap (the Mobile Suit
Cundom series). This current
contender— a bizarre, family-
friendly strategy outing starring
a monkey— is sure to split
public opinion. Incorporating
elements of cartoon combat and
city building, the deliberately
paced tale isn't going to win
any friends among action-seek-
ing armchair generals. The
oddly charming game play
mainly involves issuing orders
to a pack of primates, solving
puzzles, and evolving with the
times, ultimately arriving at
Homo sapiens status. Darwin is
largely an acquired taste, and
the easy pace is unlikely to tax
those opposable thumbs. Still,
it's a great choice if you've got
several thousand years' worth
of evolution to kill. S.S.
98 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
I
Baby shambles:
Katherine Heigl and
Seth Rogen
Pregnant Pause
AO-Year-Old Virgin team offers a tale of the unexpectant
Knocked Up -kit-k seth rogen, katherine heigl universal, r
Writer/director Judd Apatow launches this
inconsistently hilarious comedy by conjuring up
the scent of Guyville— a tangy aroma redolent of
farts, sweat, hormones, and cannabis— as a posse
of postcollegiate boys hit roller-coaster rides,
horse around their rancid house, and implement
a variety of fanciful THC-dellvery devices. The
chubby dude with the curly hair is Ben Stone
(Rogen), and one night, while at a club and on
his game, he charms the pants off of the dazzling
and generally sensible Alison (Heigl). They go
back to her place, where they miscommunicate
about a rubber, and eight weeks later, the morning-
sickness jokes kick in predictably. Ben must now
put away childish things, as well as his bong, and
win a girl in less than three trimesters.
Knocked Up must be the funniest Hollywood
romantic comedy since Apatow's 40-Year-Old
Virgin (which costarred Rogen). Granted, there
are higher compliments— folks weren't exactly
snarfing their Pepsis at The Hobday— but the
movie undeniably offers audiences many abdo-
men-impairing moments they'll talk (and talk and
talk) about: side-splitting, gut-busting, spleen-
rupturing stuff built from profane ob/gyn visits,
caring mommies who swear like reservoir dogs,
and one classic sex scene. The jokes come in an
impressive variety of paces and styles: zany screw-
balls, droll sliders, conceptual curveballs, and
pubic-hair pitches straight down the middle.
And yet, Knocl(ed Up ends up only okay, partly
because It doesn't seem grounded in reality; the
action transpires in some strange entertainment-
based universe. Alison wortu for the El channel,
It offers audiences many abdomen-
impairing moments they'll talk
(and talk and talk) about.
Ben and his boys are devising a business scheme
involving movie nude scenes, and all the riffs on
5tor Wars, Bacli to the Future, Spielberg, Scorsese,
lo5t, and even Spider-Man 3 ultimately seem
to exist for their own sake. "Marriage is like an
unfunny, tense version of Everybody Loves
Raymond," someone tells Ben at one point. But
that isn't at all true— even Raymond knows
that— and therefore, it's not really funny and
means something only in a world of pure pop.
<;POTUCHTON
The Music of Crazy Love
"She looked good, she looked fine / And I nearly lost my
mind." You've heard Manfred Mann strut through "Do Wah
Diddy Diddy" so often that the lyric has gone dull. But Burt
Pugach absolutely lost his mind over a woman, and the way
Crazy Love juxtaposes his vicious passion with Brill Building
tunes and Motown sweet talk brings all their twisted
nuances to the front of the track. Have you ever been chilled
by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles? "You treat me badly /
I love you madly." Here, it really gets a hold on you.
REVIEWS I MOVIES by troy Patterson
Black Sheep -k-k-ky,
NATHAN MEISTER. DANIELLE MASON
IfC FIRST TAK£. NOT RATFD
Bloodthirsty wool-bearers run
amok in Kiwi horror farce
A genre mash-up that nods
cheerfully to The Birds, An
American Werewolf in London,
and Toonces the Driving Cat,
director Jonathan King's first
feature doubles as a fable about
two grown brothers and triples
as a fresh national myth for his
native New Zealand. Angus
Oldfield (Peter Feeney) is
turning the family sheep farm
into a genetics lab, and his
sensitive brother Henry (Nathan
Meister)— who trembles at the
very sight of unprocessed wool-
goes home to confront him.
After a couple of animal-rights
moonbeams liberate a mutant
lamb, Henry must also confront
his darkest fear: "The sheep are
revolting!" Though the action
eventually gets cluttered— at
about the same point that the
wit goes slack with gags about
prairie oysters— S/oc/t Sheep
remains a memorably crafty
production: Seething Weta
Workshop ovines charge over
the pasture like storm clouds,
and their low bleating, rendered
in Dolby, spins your head giddily.
Paprika
ANIMATED
iONYPICTURCSClAiilCi. S
Trippy anime sci-ti thriller
doesn't lack spice
Dr. Atsuko Chiba spends her
days researching human
brains and her nights flitting
through them. This anime head
trip— directed by Satoshi Kon
(Tokyo Cod/of/iers)— pictures
Dr. Chiba's team developing a
Cronenberg-worthy gizmo that
enables therapists to enter their
patients' dreams. Some unknown
villain has gotten his cranium on
the technology, and he threatens
to waste a lot of minds, so Chiba
swings into the unconscious as
Paprika— her teen alter ego, both
damsel and detective. Though
Kon sometimes hits on startling
visions ripped straight from your
head last night, he's ultimately
more interested in film theory
than the Freudian sort, evoking
dreams in a way that's most
faithful to dream sequences.
He gets by on the charm of his
superheroine, a pixie adventur-
ess strong with pluck.
Crazy Love k-kk-k
DOCUMENTARY
MACNOUA, NOT RATED
Shocking doc explores Gotham
lawyer's criminal romance
Burt Pugach possesses one of
history's most nimble and
demented legal minds. His
biographer here calls him a
"nefarious ambulance chaser,"
while reporter Jimmy Breslin,
who's seen everything, identifies
Pugach as "the most visibly
insane person" in all New York.
At mid-century, his success
smelted sweet— a new Cadillac
every year, a personal plane,
and a nightlife spent swaggering
through the Copa as if he were
Henry Hill. In the late '505, he
spotted a Bronx beauty named
Linda Riss. In the mid-'70s, he
married her. In between, their
romance erupted as a tabloid
epic almost too grotesque to
contemplate, much less make
up. Dan Klores shapes their tale
into a documentary as arresting
as a Weegee crime-scene photo.
Oliver Drivet^asstiores / '
the fetal position in 4BM^C
Block Sheep. ^
100 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cor
ateriall
THE NEW ALBUM OUT JUNE 19
SPECIAL EDITION LP / CD / LIMITED EDITION CD-DVD / DIGITAL
ThePoiyphonicSpree.com myspace.com/poiyphonicspree
Hear a unique mashup of the album at: \ * f '
tvtrecords.com/artists/thepolyphonicspree/mashup/
REVIEWS
LIVE
Gettin'
Tipsy s
Britpop party girl Lily Allen
raids and raises the bar
BYMIKA^WOOD t
■ Ml s'.
Like any Brit worth her cider, Lily Allen is an exceptionally
high-functioning drunk. On her debut album, Alright, Still,
the 22-year-old daughter of two English showbiz vets
describes in hilarious, unsparing detail a privileged London
lifestyle of cool clubs and bad boyfriends. Yet tonight in
San Diego, Allen sounded as though a month spent on the road
had seriously cut into her daily intake of both.
"We've been to some boring-ass
towns on this tour," she said with a
weary chuclcle, "and we heard San
Diego was not one of those. Are you
gonna prove that to us?" The assembled
hipsters immediately roared their
acceptance of Allen's challenge, but
as it turned out, their participation
For all Allen's impressive
muslcallty, the crowd
came to witness her
wild-child persona.
didn't really matter "I'm already
drunic!" the singer crowed, indicating
her endorsement of the time-tested
boredom-defeating strategy. Then she
knocked back the first in a long line of
onstage libations.
The Jager shots seemed to bolster
Allen's frankness. ('This next song is
by a band called Keane," she said before
an acoustic version of the sensitive
piano-pop trio's "Everybody's
Changing." "They're a bit
wack.") But the drinking didn't
detract from her ability to put on
a show. Even though she com-
pleted Alright, Still before ever
playing live, Allen has learned
how to command a stage.
Cool-chick casual in a
flowing green blouse, short
skirt, and gleaming white high-
tops, she drew cheers by acting
out her lyrics, doing goofy
little dances, and tricking out
her sparkly pop-reggae jams
writh R&B fillips that disproved
haters' claims that Allen can't
really carry a tune.
The singer was well served
by an excellent seven-piece
band, which beefed up
Alhght's elastic grooves and
vamped thoughtfully while
Allen encouraged fans in the
front row to set up a "Lily bar" at the lip
of the stage. ("I feel like Lemmy from
Motbrhead," she giggled.)
Halfway through the 15-song set, the
musicians split, save the guitarist and
keyboardist, who backed Allen on a
"Meet my
good friend,
Mr. Jager.T
lovely rendition of "Naive," by U.K.
indie rockers the Kooks. (Allen, who
attended private school with Kooks
singer Luke Pritchard, has dissed the
band as "twats" on her MySpace page.)
Still, for all Allen's impressive musical-
ity, the crowd came to witness her
outsize wild-child persona.
And she was more than
happy to play the role, with
boozy between-song banter
about the awesomeness
of lesbians, her rapidly
increasing inebriation, and
the unnamed subject of
"Friend of Mine," who
Allen gleefully announced
had recently become a
crackhead.
"I love you, too," she
1 squealed at one point, in
response to a fan's declar-
^^^o^i. ation of devotion. "Just not
JC J(.L. as much as I love myself."
102 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
Cr;
SPIN!
The top 32, based on your votes and visits, competed.
Over 250 bands were eligible.
Four made it to the very end.
Only one was voted by you as
SPIN.com's 2006 Artist of the Year:
Boys Like Girls
Congrats, guys. Wear it well!
www.boyslikegirls.com
The Most Groundbreaking Compilation of 2007!
Featuring...
Bloc Party
Scissor Sisters
Hellogoodbye
Depeche Mode
Royksopp
She Wants Revenge
Peaches
Under The Influence of Giants,
Tracy Thorn
Jacques Lu Cont
Basement Jaxx
Tahiti 80
In Stores Now Mixed by Johnny Vicious 2XCD
MEUI VQIIK; T1HC8 90UIWE AND UNiaN SI7UflR£ [
LOS MGELEt: HOLIVUMOO S HtGHUWO IWO lUEST MOUVWOOO ;
BAM ramCISCO - OKTafllD > QROMGE . MlZmfl HIUJ ■ iOSTON I
CHtCAGO ■ OENl/ED ■ OALUU CaaPfUIHE HtlXS ■ SALT LAKE CtTV
ORUWQQ IUM.T OlSWV UflALO* RESORT I
PROMOTION
Introducing New York City's Newest Concert Venue
HIGHLINE
Check out our Blog for Conce|^^^rts& Music News: www.highlineballroom.com/blogspot
LOU
REED
OKKERVIL
RIVER
. .. .^L 30
9 PM
AMY
WINEHOUSE
MAI tt-a
8PM
JONATHA
BROOKE
MAYl
3 PM
DJ ANDY SMITH
(PORTISHEAD)
KID BEYOND
MAY 11
9 PM
MOE.
MAY 2-6
8 PM
THE GREYBOY
ALLSTARS
lAAi lid-13
9 PM
MESHELL
NDE6E0CELL0
f^Y7
8 PM
fflUKHMECT SPANK ROCK
S.GHOSTFACE
ROXY
COTTONTAIL
DJ NICK
CATCHDUBS
"VIAY 15 9PM
DANIEL
JOHNSTON
MAY 18
8PM
hich'lire festival
'david bowie
LAURIE
ANDERSON
MAY 17-18
7:30PM
HIGH LIHB FESTIVAL
cnum IT DAVID BOWIE
TALIB
KWELI
MAY 18
UPM
SECRET
MACHINES
MAY 19
9 PM
Tit MJH
HIGH LIHB FESTIVAL
c™™ IT DAVID BOWIE
THE DISCO
BISCUITS
MOSDEF-
BLACK RADIO
I
9 PM
THE BRAND
NEW HEAVIES
FEATURING
NDEA
DAVENPORT
9 PM
THE
PIPETTES
9 PM
JESSE MALIN
& SPECIAL GUEST
xuvEToiRECT DJ DRAMA
&WILLIE THE KID
THE RUB DJS
mewithoutYou
MANCHESTER ORCHESTRA
THE SNAKE
THE CROSS
THE CROWN
ok\L la
7:30PM
SHINY TOY GUNS
STARS OF TRACK
AND FIELD
THE
HOURLY
RADIO
UNE 25
PM
THE CITIZENS BA^^^Bs BUFFY SAINTE-MABIS JUNE IB FORRO IN
UTTLE BROTHER JUNf H OJOS DE BRUJO JUNE 27-28 THE BAD PLUS.
HIOHLINE BALLROOM 431 W.16TH ST BET. 9/10 AVE • NTC 218.414.6894
THE DABK/MIHO HATORIJUNE 22
;i ril il XAVIERRUDD JULY f!R 27
• WWW.HIGHUNEBALLR00M.COM
2S( FROM evERr
TICKH SOLD DONATED
TO THE HIGHUNE PARK
OQBliwEB
866.468.7619
(
PROMOTION
1 . Perry Ferrell
introducing Buzzcocks
FLASH
WISH Yf U WERE HERE . . .
6TH ANNUAL
SPIN0STUBt'S
Austin. TX. 03.16.07
For the sixth year running,
SPINOStubb's makes its way
bacl< to South by Southwest
for yet another unforgettable
party. DJs Young Love, Hugh
Cornwell, the legendary
voices of the Stranglers, and
Ian of Uncut hit the decks
while the Buzzcocks, Kings
of Leon, Galactic, Mew, the
Fratellis, and Blanche rocked
the house for a crowd of
4,000 partygoers. Special
guest host Perry Farrell
introduced the Buzzcocks,
while Pete Townshend made
his own guest appearance
and took the stage with the
Fratellis to perform the Who
song "The Seeker."
In s Peter Gaston gets cozy wJRh Matt and Kim.
OTO ALISON LEWIS
Detroit
It's the city that gave the world Motown, Kiss, Eminem,
techno, Alice Cooper, and the Nuge. Whether you're a
record collector, a style maven, a garage-rock aficionado,
or a grease monkey, D-Town has got more cultural
options than Kid Rock's got furs, by eve doster
Getting There
Because the place is referred to
as the Motor City, it's best to rent
a car. For as little as $19.99 a day.
Hertz (www.hertz.com) is a steal
For taxi/car service, call Metro
Airport Taxi at 800-745-5191 or
Metro Cars at 800-456-1701.
There's also the $23-a-day
Rent-a-Jalopy (17245 Telegraph
Rd., 313-535-5147).
WHERE TO STAY
THE INN ON FERRY
STREET
84 E. Ferry St.
The four Victorian homes
and two carriage houses
that compose the Inn on
Ferry Street are adjacent
to museums and galleries
galore. Rooms run about
$140 a night. (313-871-6000)
DETROIT MARRIOTT
AT THE RENAISSANCE
CENTER
100 Renaissance Center
This 73-story landmark
riverfront hotel overlooks
Hart Plaza, home of the
annual Movement festival.
Rooms start at S149 a night.
1313-56A-80001
110 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
DAY
1
Breakfast
EVIE'STAMALES
3454 Bagley St.
One of the more authentic
establishments in Detroit's
historic Mexicantown; for less
than ten bucks, you can feast on
delectable tamales or a steak-
and-eggs breakfast that'll distend
the gut for hours. (313-M3-5056)
Lunch
HONEST JOHN'S BAR
&NOCRIU
488 Selden St.
Proprietor/philanthropist
John Thompson co-opted the
dilapidated Cass Corridor
building, where his troubled
mother once turned tricks, and
refashioned it into a backslappin'
neighborhood bar vi/ith an
ultra-amiable staff. Besides
offering humongous deli-style
Sammies and hearty soups.
Honest John's donates some of
its profits to help Detroit's poor-
see "Dips for Turkeys," a wacky
midwinter fundraiser at which
participants jump into a frosty
Detroit River. It's also one of the
few joints in town with
Wi-Fi access. (313-832-JOHN)
Afternoon
Revisit the 1960s at the hallowed
Motown Historical Museum
(2648 W. Grand Blvd., 313-875-
2264), tucked unassumingly in its
original location in a row of
houses on a residential street.
Check out Michael Jackson's
sequined glove, early reverb
techniques (a hole cut into the
ceiling). Berry Gordy's apartment,
and tfie chill-inducing Studio A,
where Motown's ghosts bounce
from wall to wall. Then amble
through downtown's crown
jewel. Campus Martius Park
(www.campusmartiuspark.com),
where you can hear live music
or even partake of some outdoor
yoga. Fifteen minutes on the
freeway will get you to the
"Rock Stars' Cars & Guitars "
exhibit (opening June 9) at the
Henry Ford Museum (20900
Oakwood Blvd., Deartwrn, 313-
271-1620)— ideal for gearheads
and groupies alike.
Dinner
SLOWS BAR BQ
2138 Michigan Ave.
Detroit's latest hot
spot, this high-end
Southern barbecue
is revered for its
modern take on
soul food and creative vegetarian
options, hence the late-night
hipster visits. The macaroni and
cheese (try adding some North
Carolina sauce) and "Special
Purpose" (a burger inspired by
Steve Martin's classic comedy
77ie ierk, featuring bacon, spicy
onions, and smoked Gouda) are
musts. (313-962-9828)
Evening
A tornado of bands like the White
Stripes, Adult., and the Electric
Six cut their teeth at Detroit's
legendary Magic Stick/Garden
Bowl (4120 Woodward Ave., 313-
833-9700). But the eye of Detroit's
musical storm is a collection of
underground treasures, such as
U's Lounge (2411 Michigan Ave.,
313-962-0013), where in-house
DJs and bartenders include a
handful of local rock stars (the
Von Bondies' Marcie Bolen, for
example), and the cavernous
Bohemian National Home (3009
Tillman St., 313-737-6606), a nifty
place to see avant-garde jazz
and experimental, noise-heavy
rock'n'roll.
CITY GUIDE
Late Night
Funk Night at OUD, Contemporary
Art Institute of Detroit (5141
Rosa Parks Blvd., 313-899-CAIO),
is a recurring dance party that's
been known to spill over into the
parking lot and beyond. Come
hear this soundtrack of forgotten
funk and soul on the last Friday
of every month. The art nonprofit
also hosts Northern Soul Night
and rock shows.
DAY
Breakfast
RUSSELL STREET DEU
2465 Russell St.
You'll have to share your table
with other guests because of
the crowds that descend on this
place, but it's worth it. The daily
specials are always a bargain,
and the vegetarian hash is
unusually savory. (313-567-2900)
Lunch
ROMA CAFE
3401 Riopelle St.
Detroit's oldest Italian restaurant
is steeped in old-world
romanticism, down to the
tuxedo-clad waiters who dote on
and flirt v^th guests. Lunch runs
$13 to $25. (313-831-5940)
Afternoon
Record collectors the world over
make pilgrimages to Detroit
because of the seemingly endless
supply of classic and obscure vinyl
confections. Sort through the
rock, funk, and R&B in the dusty
bins at People's Records (615 W.
Forest Ave., 313-831-0864), Mays'
Used Records (126 W. Eight Mile
Rd., Hazel Park, 248-547-7470),
and Record Graveyard (10201
Joseph Campau St., Hamtramck,
313-870-9647).
Dinner
POLISH VILLAGE CAFC
2990 N. Yemans, Hamtramck
THC WHITE STdlPiS
Hotel Yorba inspired the White Stripes song.
Cci
aterlal
1
This subterranean restaurant
feels more like home than your
own house, probably because
your residence doesn't feature
a hearty "city chicken" (breaded
pork and veal), traditionally
dressed waitresses, and massive
goblets of icy Polish beer. (313-
874-S726)
Evening
Known for having one of the
best sound systems in the
country. Small's (10339 Conant,
Hamtramck, 313-873-1117)
has a close-to-perfect setup for
watching live rock'n'roll. Less
known for its acoustic prowess
breakfast for $2, and also for
spawning a boy-girl jug-band
outfit called, appropriately. Two
Dollar Breakfast. The band is no
more, but Steak Hut's hungover
minions are still greeted by the
soothing sounds of acoustic
strumming every Sunday
morning. (313-961-0659)
Lunch
LASHISH
22041 Michigan Ave., Deartorn
Dearborn has one of the densest
Arab populations outside
of the Middle East and is a
treasure trove of exotic food and
art. La Shish is known for its
I
and more for its penchant for
anarchy, the Painted Lady (2930
Jacob St., Hamtramck, 313-874-
2991) is one of the last surviving
old-school punk-rock hangouts
in the area. There's also the
Befanont (10215 Joseph Campau
St., Hamtramck, 313-871-1966),
home of Mademoiselle Mondays,
where guests can get a manicure
and martini for ten bucks.
Late Night
Blow a wad at the swankiest of
the three downtown casinos,
Creektown Casino (555 E.
Lafayette Blvd., 888-771-4FUN),
where the party quite literally
never stops. There's also the
more rough-and-tumble
MototCity Casino (2901 Grand
River Ave., 313-237-7711) or the
MGM Grand Detroit Casino
(1300 John C. Lodge Fwy., 877-
888-2121), for a little slice of
Vegas kitsch delivered directly to
the Midwest.
DAY
Breakfast
STEAK HUT
1S51 W. Ufayette Blvd.
A few years back, this greasy
spoon became an unlikely local
treasure for offering a two-
egg, hash browns, and toast
ultrahealthy fare, including a
fresh-squeezed potable dubbed
Potassium Broth. (313-565-5500)
Afternoon
Concoct your own variation of
the morning-after staple at the
Bloody Mary buffet at the Bronx
Bar (4476 Second Ave., 313-832-
8464), a watering hole that's so
rock'n'roll, it has two jukeboxes.
After the hair of the dog kicks in
and does its magic, head over to
the Car Wash CM (444 Meldrum
St.), an "urban art museum" that
also serves as a (sometimes) car
wash, (sometimes) ice cream
parlor, and (sometimes) music
venue. Later, swing southwest
for a look at the legendarily
dilapidated Hotel Yorba (4020
Lafayette Blvd., 313-554-2250),
the spot that both inspired the
White Blood Cells tune and served
as the backdrop for the video.
While in the neighborhood,
satisfy your footwear fetish at
Shoe Fair (5872 W. Fort St.,
313-843-4020), which stocks the
latest sneakers at discount prices,
but also has a seemingly endless
supply of vintage shoes from the
'60s and '70s just waiting to be
snapped up.
Dinner
THE DAKOTA INN
RATHSKELLER
17324 John R. St.
Spaetzle, schnitzel, and
schweinefleisch are but a few
spittle-worthy reasons to eat
here, not to mention the actual
lederhosen-dad oompah band.
This Bavarian oasis in the middle
of a slightly blighted part of
town encourages visitors to
bask in the warmth of some
"otde-style" merrymaking (writh
the aid of plenty of frothy ale)
without denting your wallet.
(313-867-9722)
Evening
if you've got the summertime
blues and need a little holiday
spirit, the Comet Bar (128 Henry
St., 313-964-1508) is decorated
for Christmas year-round,
complete w/ith blinking lights
and dancing Santas; they also
have killer karaoke nights and
a backyard patio with picnic
tables and a funky family-reunion
vibe— as long as your family
includes hipsters, vets, and
trannies. It's right up the road
from the Motor City Brewing
Woriis (470 W. Canfield St.,
313-832-2700), where DJs like
Mick Collins (the Dirtbombs) and
Jim Diamond (Ghetto Recorders)
throw back microbrews and
spin tasty Detroit rock and R&B.
If you need a little slice of the
South in the Great Lakes, hit up
Baker's Keyixurd Lounge (20510
Livernois Ave., 313-345-6300), a
jazz institution since the '30s that
also offers some tasty soul food.
Late Night
LAFAYETTE CONEY ISLAND
118 W. Lafayette Blvd.
Coney dogs are a regional
phenomenon, and there are a
number of places that claim to
serve the best in town, but this
spot lovingly wraps its franks
in mustard, onions, chili, and
cheese. They go down smooth
whether you're soused or stone
sober. (313-964-8198)
SPIN (ISSN 0886-30331. Volume 23, Number 6. Copyright t: 2007 by Spin Medw LLC. All rights reserved
Published moothly In the United States by Sptn Media LLC. 205 Lexington Ave,, New Vbrlr. NY 10O16, for
questions about new or current subscripoons, call 80O274-7597 or email magcustserv@cdsluUiilmenE,com,
To ctunge yocjr addcess. sersd both old and new addressee to Spin, PC Box s68b. Harlan. lA S1S93-1186
Allow six to eight weeks for processing. aussoupnaN COSTS U-5. and Its pos-sesslons: one-year basic rate.
$14.9S: two years. S24,00. Canada: one year. $24.00 1U.S.). Foreign; one year, SSO.IX) (U S) Periodical postage
pail] at New Yorit, NY, arid at addttwisal malting offices POSTMASnR: Send address cfsanges to Spin. PC
Box S686, Hartan, iA S1593-1186. Editorial offKes; 205 Lexington Ave,, New York. NY loaib: teL 212-23T-
7400, Pubtisher disclaims all responsibility 10 return unsolicited editorial matter, and all rights in portions
published vest In psibdsher. Letters to Spin magazine or Its editors are assumed intended for publication In
whole or in part without permission from the writer. Any similarity between persons or plates mentioned
in the hction or semihctlon and real places or persons living or dead Is cotncidefitaL Single cotJies: $3,99
in U S and Af^O. 55 50 in Canada. t2J5 In U.K.
Not in New York,
but twice as
hard-core
Cobra Style
The Detroit Cobras' Rachel
Nagy on her hot spots
MAJESTIC THEATER
4140 Woodward Ave.
Nagy says: "This is the place
that everything revolves
around in Detroit rock music.
Big bands play in the theater,
and there's a room upstairs
where the smaller ones play.
They've got a pizzeria, so
after a show, you can pick up
a slice to soak up the booze."
THE OLD MIAMI
3930 Cass Ave.
"It's an interesting mix-
there are punk rockers, but
it's also a veterans' bar. You
don't really remember the
shows you see here. I usually
get drunk and stumble home.
Luckily, it's within walking
distance of my house."
THE ROYAL OAK
MUSIC THEATRE
318 W. Fourth St., Royal Oak
"It's in the suburbs, where
all the white people with
money hang out. You can
put on a dress and make
jocks buy you drinks."
2500 CLUB
2506 Park St.
"Metal bands play here some-
times, but it's also a drag
club— you can have a cocktail
with the transvestitesl"
THE BRONX BAR
4476 Second Ave.
"It's a Kttle dark bar with a
great jukebox. It's so dark
that when there was that
big blackout a few summers
ago, the Bronx stayed open,
since it didn't took any
different than usual. We
barbecued outside."
RAVEN LOUNGE &
RESTAURANT
514S Chene St.
"The Raven's been around
forever. It's in a really
fucked-up, burned-out area,
but it's great. Old blues guys
play on the weekends, and
the bartender fries up some
mean catfish."
COMERICA PARK
2100 Woodward Ave.
"The Tigers did well last year,
so now the games are bring-
ing in more people. If you're
down on your luck and need
to make a few dollars, you
can guide suburbanites to
empty parking lots, charge
them, and leave."
EL COMAL
RESTAURANT
3456 W. Vernor Hwy.
"This place has the greatest
Mexican food. It used to just
be in someone's basement
with folding chairs, but they
have a really nice restaurant
now. They go way beyond
tacos— there are these things
called pupusas, which are
tortillas stuffed with pork
and cheese. They're the shit."
MAYS' USED RECORDS
126 W. Eight Mile Rd.
"I've been going here for
years. It's run by this old
creepy guy who reminds me
of Comic Book Guy from The
Simpsons. It's just this dirty,
dusty place jam-packed with
records. You can spend a
whole day rummaging there.
Afterward, you're itching
and sneezing a lot, but it's
worth it."
MORE AT SPINXOM Planning a trip to Detroit? Find crucial
links by logging on to vvww.spin.com/detroittour
WWW.SPIN.COM JUNE 2007 111
Ci ■:
iterial
THE HIDDEN TRACK
Blitzkrieg Pop
An American novelist tours Germany and learns die Kinder are alright by joe hill
No NEWS FLASH HERE: AMERICA'S NO. 1 EXPORT IS ITSELF, AND
Deutschland is buying. A variety of aggressive, bred-in-the-USA
infections have been making a yeasty stink in the Fatherland's meta-
phorical crotch over the past decade: Britney and Paris, Wild Hogs,
and, this past March, yours truly.
February saw the release of my first novel, Hean-Shaped Box, about a bad-tem-
pered death-metal god — think Motorhead's Lemmy, only even less pretty — who
buys a haunted suit on the Internet. Aside from the obvious Nirvana reference,
the novel's four parts have titles lifted from hard-rock tracks ("Black Dog," "Ride
On," "Hurt," "Alive"), and the story is at least in part a meditation on the way
a certain kind of damaged person will turn to loud, angry music as a way to
armor himself against the world's sharp edges. My German publisher saw in this
aspect of the book a clever promotional possibility: Why not send me on a tour,
not of bookstores, but of clubs, to put on readings between performances by
local rock acts? 1 figured I had at least as much right to tour German rock clubs
as David Hasselhoff — we both have the same approximate amount of musical
talent (none), but at least I know it.
The tour kicked off in Hamburg, where I met up with a voice actor named
Tommy Morgenstem. In our performances together, we'd be taking turns — ^Tommy
reading a chapter in German for every chapter I'd read in English. Tommy is
young and sturdy with a head of handsomely rumpled hair, and, most impres-
sively, he is the German voice of Beavis and Butt-head.
Our first reading was at a broken-glass-and-puke-on-the-floor punk club on
the edges of the Reeperbahn, where prostitution is legal and women pose in
their frillies behind neon-lit windows. The band that was supposed to open for
us didn't show. Their bus broke down in the Netherlands — how rock'n'roll is
that? Their replacements were a grotty-looking crew in stained black denim
who used their music as a blunt instrument to bludgeon the crowd. I liked
'em, although one of their songs had only a single discernible line, repeated
to the point of absurdity — "We blow
you away!" — a statement that was,
frankly, a case of wishful thinking. The
surprise to me was that this very Teutonic
band sang in English... a language also
well understood by the vast majority
of the audience. For the German entertain-
ment junkie, at least a passing familiarity
with English seemed essential.
I had only been in the country a day and
already felt the taint of cultural imperial-
ism on me. I took my uneasy conscience
with me to Berlin, where the next night,
Tommy and I got to talking about what it
takes for a homegrown act to make it in
Germany, to get a native signal through
all that American noise. Tommy spoke
disdainfully of the American /do/-style
programming swamping the German
airwaves, churning out assembly-line pop
stars, while down-in-the-streets rock bands
struggle for attention. I was with him on
that — even though Idol derives from a
European show, the U.S. made it bigger
and fatter and more omnipresent. The
winners of such contests are sexy and can
carry a time, but no one will be threatened
by their ideas. They don't have any. Whereas, you can't really separate Bruce
Springsteen's popularity from his particular point of view.
Out of guilt for whatever role I was playing in helping to poison Germany's
cultural well, I was drowning myself in Bavarian beer in a Munich club on my
last night in the country when my final opening act climbed onto the stage.
Three chords later I was sitting all the way up in my chair. The band was called
Five! Fast!! Hits!!!, and for the next eight minutes (how long it took them to
play four songs), I was fixated. Dressed in a suit and skinny tie, with hair to his
shoulders, the lead guitarist looked and played like a long-lost Followill brother.
The singer was a pale-haired v«sp of a boy, so at ease onstage he couldn't actually
stay there — instead, he drifted into the crowd and sang while lounging among
some college girls who were quickly overcome by the giggles. First, I was thinking
the band sounded like the Strokes playing behind Billie Joe Armstrong: then they
did a song that was like Fountains of Wayne covering Johnny Cash, which was
when it finally hit me that, really, they just sounded like themselves, and I could
finish my beer without guilt.
So that's Germany right now. Its people are stuck vnth the sometimes crude,
sometimes beautiful influence of our culture, but they're watching closely and
taking what they like and mashing it together into something uniquely them and
not us. Germany has Five! Fast!! Hits!!!, clever and full of fire, and by the time
they were done, 1 was just counting myself lucky to have a chance to appear
anywhere near them.
So I did my reading, and everyone laughed in the right places, and it was a
good time, but I cut it shorter than usual, because no matter what language you
speak, when you get out of work and head to a club v^rith your friends, you just
wanna rock, and Five! Fast!! Hits!!! had another set to play.*
Joe Hill is the author of Heart-Shaped Box and a forthcoming book of stories,
20th Century Ghosts.
112 JUNE 2007 WWW.SPIN.COM
ILLUSTRATION BY JOSH COCHRAN
/
Live Music
Archive
Librivox
Free Audio
Metropolitan Museum
Cleveland
Museum of Art
Internet
Arcade
Console Living Room
Open Library
American
Libraries
TV News
Understanding
9/11